


Cover Me

by Ars_Longa



Series: The Springsteen trilogy [2]
Category: Star Wars, Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-17
Updated: 2012-03-22
Packaged: 2017-10-26 05:14:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 81,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/279092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ars_Longa/pseuds/Ars_Longa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Frankly, I suck in summaries - especially when I have to sum something that was written as an effort to put to rights all the issues that have been bothering me throughout the entire Vong War series and some of the earlier books. What went wrong between Kyp Durron and Luke Skywalker? How a child who barely knew how to use the Force managed to survive the harshest prison in the Galaxy? Why the Jedi of Luke's first class faded to the background prior to the war and were not exactly visible during the War? Why Luke never seemed to be able to hold on to a girl? Can Mara Jade overcome her issues with Luke's past and come to terms with Kyp Durron and his role in her husband's life? What it takes to wear off the resilience of someone who has never been broken? What happened to Kyp's kids? And, finally, if Jaina Solo is the Sword of the Jedi, then who is the Shield?</p><p>Above all, though, it's a love story. Not romance, mind you. Just love, with its many faces.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: all sorts of, but in the later chapters. Let’s get it straight: it’s not a ‘family-friendly’ reading. I don't subscribe to the idea that Star Wars universe is a benign mistress. The chapters will be labeled separately, so please watch for warnings. No character death, though, I can promise that much.
> 
> Disclaimer: Luke Skywalker, Kyp Durron, Mara Jade Skywalker, Han Solo, Leia Organa Solo, and some others, not to mention the whole universe, belong to Lucas and Co. At least in our world they do. I’m only playing with them, out of love for the characters and respect for their creators. No money earned, no harm intended. My original characters belong to me, and if you want to play with them, ask.
> 
> Thanks: to my beta hlglne – fixing my weird grammar is a gruesome task, and I’m well aware of it.
> 
> Dedication: to my friend Stephanie, without whom this fiction would have never been written.
> 
> ***

_  
  
_

_The times are tough now  
Just getting tougher  
This old world is rough  
It's just getting rougher  
Cover me  
Come on baby cover me  
Well I'm lookin’ for a lover who will come on in  
And cover me_

 _  
  
_

  
_  
_

_Now promise me baby  
That you won't let them find us  
Hold me in your arms,  
Let's let our love blind us,  
Cover me  
Shut the door and cover me  
Well I'm lookin' for a lover who will come on in  
And cover me_

 _  
_   


 

### Chapter 1

### 

 

Four lightsabers flashed in the artificial light of the exercise room, looking unusually dull in comparison to the overly bright glow-rods up under the ceiling. Four blades, two green and two purple, whirled in a complicated dance of slashes and parries, making the two men who were wielding them seem like secondary participants in the show.

 _It’s all Jacen’s fault,_ Luke thought with uncharacteristic irritation. _Why, in the name of Twin Suns, did he have to remember it now, and why did I go along with this idea?_

It seemed innocuous enough at the beginning. They had been having a family dinner the night before – he, Mara, and Jacen, who had lost his position of meld coordinator in the First Fleet after the stunt he pulled at the end of the battle at Ebaq 9. Traest Kre’fey had been less than happy with such an obvious and demonstrative breach of discipline and unofficially, but firmly, requested for Jacen to be recalled back to Mon Cal, which brought a certain sense of relief to Luke. After everything Jacen had been through, the Jedi Master preferred his nephew to be close by.

Han and Leia had been absent, sadly, being busy with Han’s Smuggler's Alliance group, which needed a lot of work after the losses it had suffered at Ebaq 9, but Jaina was present. She had been ordered to Mon Cal to help with the new pilots’ training and the creating of new simulator programs, and Luke was very glad to see his niece starting to relax, after everything she’d had to endure in that battle. They ate, they joked, they talked about Han, and Leia, and Ben; all in all, it was a very pleasant evening.

Then Jacen had made a comment about him, Luke, saving his stupid butt on Belkadan, while fighting the Yuuzhan Vong warriors with two lightsabers. That drew immediate attention from both Mara and Jaina, who had never before seen him doing that. Both wanted a demonstration, and since Kyp Durron, Luke’s one and only sparring partner in this form of combat, was also there, on Mon Cal, Luke readily agreed to provide it.

He was starting to regret this decision now. Outwardly, nothing was wrong. Their small crowd of spectators, which consisted of Mara, Jacen, Jaina, Kenth Hamner, and Octa Ramis, Kyp’s current second-in-command, definitely weren’t suspecting anything. Luke, however, knew better.

Kyp was currently losing the sixth round out of six, and that wasn’t normal, no matter what everybody thought.

Luke knew that his superiority in lightsaber combat was unquestionable in the Order. And if it had been a single-lightsaber fight, he wouldn’t have been worried, either, because normally he won eight rounds out of ten against Kyp. Dual sabers, however, were another matter entirely. This form of combat had been Kyp’s idea, and his favorite hobbyhorse, to begin with.

It all had started many years ago, in the first years of the Academy’s existence. One day, after a particularly vigorous and demanding week of exercises, the students asked for a day off. Luke, also more worn out than usual, granted it readily. They spent that day sleeping, eating, joking around and playing games, and then, when the night started to wrap its dark purple-orange robes around the Temple, they all gathered in the common room to watch a holovid together.

The holovid had proved to be an old Clone Wars era action drama about the Yovshin Swordsmen. The fight sequences displayed in it were outstanding, and while most of the students were just watching it and holding their collective breath, ever-practical Kyp was actually the first to propose trying the Jar’kai style with lightsabers.

The idea had been accepted with enthusiasm, which receded significantly after the first couple of weeks. The main reason was that Jar’kai hadn’t been, exactly, an independent style. It was more of an application, a method, and every fighter that used it had to adapt his particular preferred style to the use of two weapons. It required exceptional coordination, better than usual precision, and general proficiency that almost all of the new Jedi hadn’t mastered yet.

Not to mention that it also had required ambidextrous abilities that most of his students lacked. Luke, however, had got used to relying on his left hand out of sheer necessity, and had never quite gotten out of the habit, still harboring a sort of distrust for his cybernetic right hand. Kyp, on his side, got used to employing both of his hands on Kessel, where learning to do that was the only means by which he was able to collect the amount of spice required and not get himself punished on a regular basis. At the end, they were the only two left who hadn’t abandoned the Jar’kai. Even Kam Solusar cast it off, coming to the conclusion that it was of no use against an experienced single-bladed opponent, if you couldn’t do it right. And the others had enough trouble learning the single-weapon combat to even think about mastering dual blades.

Kyp, nevertheless, had been skilled enough and stubborn enough to continue working on it. Luke strongly suspected that the fact that it was the only form of combat in which Kyp was able to beat him soundly was the primary reason behind Kyp’s persistence. That fact itself was easily explainable: Kyp’s personal fighting style, based mostly on the Ataru form, with its reliance on quick movements, acrobatics, and agility, was better suited to Jar’kai than Luke’s own Djem So, whose wide attacking slashes were losing a lot of power when performed one-handed.

Luke often wondered why Kyp, who had developed his style during the years when he was the smallest and weakest of all Jedi students, and had to compensate, never switched to another style that would have been more suited to his current greater height and physical power. Probably it was because the only style he could have adopted would have been Djem So, and competing with his own Master in his own style would have been something that Kyp, consciously or not, wasn’t eager to do.

He could have won, after all, and while Kyp’s habitual deference to Luke was starting to wear thin, besting his Master in such a fundamental way would have been more than even Kyp’s ego could digest. The dual-saber combat, however, had been widely considered not important in the New Order. It was a fad, a foible; it was a safe ground. Here Kyp could let himself loose on Luke and not be afraid that his victory would have any far-reaching consequences.

Therefore, Luke knew very well that his winning six bouts in a row with Kyp hadn’t been anything close to normal. Either Kyp was consciously throwing a fight, not wanting to embarrass Luke before a crowd that wasn’t used to see him losing, or something was seriously wrong with his former student. Luke fell back a bit, not pressing his advantage, and probed the younger Master carefully. What he found made him wince.

Kyp’s mental shields were always formidable. But now they weren’t simply strong; they were airtight-sealed, as thick and hard as the walls of their old Temple. Not a whiff of a thought or emotion would be able to squeeze out; not a thing, no matter how insignificant, would be able to get in. And Luke knew very well that no one needed this kind of fortification unless there were some exceptionally good reasons for such a level of security. Erecting and maintaining such a shield tended to impede one’s connection to the Force, and it was actually a miracle, a testimony to Kyp’s extraordinary abilities, that he was still able to put on a good enough fight, and that Luke only now started to suspect something was wrong.

Luke deflected Kyp’s attack with one lightsaber in a block over his head and another at waist level, and then swiped Kyp’s blades with a half-circular inward movement that pushed Kyp back with both of his sabers pressed dangerously close to his face. Kyp bent backward, and sidestepped neatly, pivoting on one foot. It took his body out of immediate danger, and redirected both Luke’s blades to the opposite side forcibly, which threw the older Master off-stride and slightly off-balance. Kyp, however, was unable to press his advantage, since the momentum took him whirling too far away from his opponent.

A quiet snapping sound of a hair clasp would have been unnoticed in the midst of all this activity, if not for the fact that Kyp’s hair flew loose, following its owner in the spin, and plastering itself to Kyp’s sweaty face.

Luke took a step back and thumbed off both lightsabers at the same moment Kyp turned his weapons blades down in his raised hands, indicating a request for a break. Kyp nodded his gratitude, put his sabers on a bench and started to fish his recalcitrant hair clasp from under it, gathering the wet locks off his face at the same time. His military gray tank top was soaked with sweat – and that wasn’t normal, either. Usually it took much more than meager twenty-something minutes of sparring to make him break into a sweat, but, obviously, without a proper connection to the Force, the fight had been much more taxing physically.

The younger Master stood up again, popped the silver metallic clasp between his teeth, and started finger-combing his curly black mane back with quick, absent motions.

Suddenly Luke’s vision started to blur. A memory of something that happened long ago surfaced in his brain, blending with the current vision, replacing it in his eyes. A younger, smoother version of that same face, tilted at the same angle, started to bleed through the harsh, strained features before him. A spark of arousal shot through Luke, reminding him painfully that he knew the body under the ragged tank top and baggy training pants very well-- too well; better than he should have. It had been almost fifteen years since that fateful night when he abandoned everything he thought he knew about himself, surrendered his control and his body, violated every notion of propriety he knew of, and lived to not regret it in the morning. But no matter how often he tried to tell himself otherwise, Luke Skywalker hadn’t forgotten a thing.

He took a deep breath, and willed the stubborn memory away. He was a different man now. Kyp was a different man now. Nothing that had happened between them back then had any relation to what they were currently doing.

Mara’s voice, sharp and sarcastic, interrupted his thoughts and helped to ground him in the here and now. “You should consider getting a haircut, Durron. The Vong won’t wait until you’ve finished styling your pride and glory.”

“Yuuzhan Vong,” corrected Jacen.

Mara shrugged. Kyp didn’t answer. Not a muscle twitched on his still, tight-lipped face, as if he hadn’t heard a word, as if she wasn’t there at all. He clicked the clasp back into place, and shook his head vigorously, testing the strength of its hold.

Of course, it only served to infuriate Mara further. “It’d be a prudent thing to do,” she said even more cattily. “Or are you afraid women would stop noticing you without your main attraction?”

This one, at last, got a response out of Kyp. “My main attraction?” he asked quietly, barely turning his head. “Speaking from personal experience, Jade?” And with that, he turned to Luke, not even bothering to see the redhead’s reaction, and called both lightsabers back to his hands. “Shall we?”

Everyone tried not to look at Mara, who stood there with her teeth clenched hard, trying to glare a hole in the back of the black-haired Jedi’s head. Everyone except Octa, who was snickering openly. Luke, himself, while feeling sympathy for his wife, was unable to suppress a flicker of amusement. Everyone who was familiar with Kyp Durron knew better than to try to pick on him; Mara, however, hadn’t had a lot of contact with the younger man over the years, and, therefore, had been unprepared to hear this quick, cutting wit directed at herself. But, if he knew his wife, and he did, he had better do something before she decided to take the challenge and up the stakes. The last thing he needed was another conflict between those two.

He ignited his lightsabers and prepared to press an attack, hoping that even an infuriated Mara would realize the futility of exchanging insults with a man engaged in combat, but it proved to be unnecessary. The shrill, annoying sound of Jaina’s military comlink redirected everybody’s attention immediately.

His niece made a face, but answered right away. “Lieutenant Colonel Solo.”

No one was able to hear what had been said, but after switching it off Jaina turned to them with a crooked smile. “Sorry for that. I’ve got to go. Kyp?”

He handed out one of the purple sabers and gave her a small, sympathetic smile. “Another briefing?”

“Yeah,” she said with irritation. “More boring stuff. They just can’t live without my indispensable opinion. I’m surprised they haven’t called you, as well.”

As if it just had been waiting for a cue, Kyp’s comlink, which was lying under his shirt on a bench, went off. Kyp twitched the garment away and grabbed the device. “Durron,” he snapped at whoever was on the other side, then listened. “Half an hour, Colonel, unless you really don’t mind obnoxious odors. You caught me in the middle of a sparring session. Yes. Yes, I’ll tell her.” He switched it off and turned to Jaina. “I just won you at least twenty minutes. Grab me a caf on your way, will you?” Then he turned to Octa and looked at her inquiringly, while putting on his shirt.

“Only the sims,” his second answered to his unvoiced question. “And you know damn well we can manage them without you. Catch some shut-eye, Kyp. Probably all that endless droning during the briefing will finally put you to sleep.”

Her commander scowled at her, but obeyed her shooing gesture and left the room in a hurry. Luke sighed. This rushed and abrupt end was almost anticlimactic. Despite Kyp’s deteriorated condition, he hadn’t had such an excellent sparring partner since the beginning of the war, and, frankly, Luke missed it, missed the familiar thrill, missed the opportunity to best a worthy adversary in combat that wasn’t lethal.

Mara turned on her heel and stormed out of the room. Kenth Hamner, obviously uncomfortable, uttered a brief excuse and followed her. Now it was only himself, Jacen, and Octa left, and the Chandrillian woman was still lingering, as if expecting Jacen to leave so she could talk to Luke.

“Aunt Mara isn’t happy,” Jacen stated serenely. “But it was great, Uncle Luke. I had no idea Kyp was that good.”

“He’s usually better than that,” Luke answered. “For some reason he wasn’t fighting at his full ability today.”

Octa opened her mouth, as if wanting to say something, then promptly shut it again.

“Go on, Jacen,” Luke said to his nephew. “I’ll be along soon.”

Jacen looked at him, at Octa, nodded his understanding, and left.

“What’s wrong with Kyp, Octa?” Luke asked her, as soon as the door closed behind Jacen.

“I have no idea, Master Skywalker,” the stocky woman answered readily. “But something is, that’s for sure.”

He sat on the bench and indicated that she should do the same. “Tell me more. What exactly have you noticed?”

The young Jedi hesitated. “He’ll probably give me the cold shoulder for a week even for what I already let out. But what the kriff... if he can’t take care of himself, someone should. He hasn’t been sleeping well, that’s the first. I don’t even know since when, but definitely as long as we have been staying here on Mon Cal. Our rooms are next to each other. In fact, it’s one room that was split in half by a very thin wall, and I am not getting enough sleep because I have to listen to his constant pacing and tossing and turning.”

Luke frowned. The Dozen was relocated to Mon Calamari a good month ago, both for the purpose of letting Kyp participate in the Council meetings and letting his pilots, almost all of whom were seasoned veterans, help with the training of new recruits. If Kyp had been having problems with sleep for that amount of time, it would definitely explain his poor physical condition. But not that heavy fortification of his shielding.

“What else, Octa?” Luke asked insistently.

“He has been... very moody lately.”

Luke waited, trying to curb his impatience.

The woman sighed. “He’s not joking and bantering with us anymore, and when he does, it comes out much more sarcastic than usual. You can practically remove rust with those comments. I don’t know, Master Skywalker, it’s hard to explain. I know people often think of Kyp as guarded and aloof... and it might be true, to a degree. But he has always been pretty open with us. He really has a talent for uniting people, for making us feel like a family, instead of just another fighting unit. But he’s closing himself off now, to us as well as to others, and our guys don’t like that at all. We used to gather together regularly, just to sit and talk, and joke, and sing songs, you know, just let ourselves relax and enjoy life. But each time we want to do that now, he says he’s too busy. And that’s also true, but we can’t help feeling abandoned. He’s always found time before.”

“Have you considered asking him what’s going on?”

She shrugged. “You know Kyp. He’d never admit something is wrong with him. Not to his subordinates, at least. He thinks he’s supposed to be the reliable one. Probably it’s as simple as the strain of the war finally starting to get to him. Probably he just needs a break.” She smiled sadly. “But I don’t know how to make him take one.” She hesitated again, then continued. “Master Skywalker, do you have any idea how much work he’s doing here?”

“As much as any of us, I suppose,” Luke answered. “He’s a Council member, and a squadron commander as well, which makes a double load, but many of us are doing that. Cilghal, Kenth, Saba...”

Octa started to shake her head even before he finished. “He’s going to kill me for this,” she mumbled under her breath. “That’s not all, Master. He’s also acting as Admiral Kre’fey’s personal representative, and that includes at least as much work as the other two put together, and most of it is worse than pulling out gundarks’ teeth. He’s smoothing the bureaucratic channels to ensure that the supplies for the fleet wouldn’t end up sitting in the warehouses for months, or won’t be sent to parts unknown because some clerk was being stupid that day. He also makes sure that they are assigned to us in the first place – you know how hard the competition is now for supplies; everyone needs everything.”

Luke took a deep breath and let it out slowly. That was work he wouldn’t wish on his worst enemy, much less on someone like Kyp. “Why, Octa?” he asked, with rising exasperation. “Couldn’t the Admiral find someone a bit less valuable to do the job of a supply pusher?”

“The only thing the Admiral cares about,” the young Jedi answered harshly, “is whether the job is done well. When Kyp is doing it, everything comes twice as fast as when it’s done by anyone else.” She smiled sardonically. “Probably because most of those clerks are female. Also, because people are less likely to say ‘no’ to Kyp Durron than to anyone else. Master Skywalker, I had no idea how much work he had to do until two weeks ago, when he asked me to start keeping track of all his meetings, because he wasn’t able to remember them all anymore. I tried to talk him into giving up at least the sims – but Force forbid he’d allow himself some slack in anything he considers his duty!” She hissed in irritation. “He’s so _stubborn!_ ”

Luke almost smiled, in complete discordance to the situation. Octa’s phrase brought back memories, all right. He could almost feel the taste of fresh water on his lips again. It seemed that now Kyp might be the one who needed the proverbial toss in a lake.

Octa was sitting beside him, rubbing her forehead tiredly with the tips of her fingers. To his dismay, Luke noticed that she was almost in tears – and that was, in itself, as alarming as Kyp’s condition. Octa had always been a stable one, not without some faults and emotional outbursts, but definitely not prone to fall into despair. He couldn’t even remember her crying after the death of her lover and longtime friend, Miko Reglia.

“Octa,” he asked suddenly, surprising himself. He usually didn’t pry into other people’s private matters. “Do you love him?”

She smiled crookedly and shook her head. “No. Not like I loved Miko, in any case. Kyp’s just... special. He brings warmth into our lives. Without him, this war would have been one cold, endless, hopeless struggle. One day, I was just sitting in a mess hall over a bowl of disgusting soup and suddenly realized I don’t want to live in a galaxy without Kyp in it, without his smile, without his jokes, without his resolve, without his ‘but of course you can do it, Octa!’ I just hate to see him as he is now,” she finished with quiet intensity. “He needs help, but he’d never accept mine. Probably if you try, he’d listen to you. I don’t know who else...” Her voice trailed off.

Luke squeezed her hand. “Thank you. I’ll help him if he allows me. Is there anything else that might be important?” For some reason he had a feeling she wasn’t telling him the whole story.

Octa fidgeted nervously. “Yes, there is. But if I tell you that, he’ll kill me for sure, and I’ll even stay still so he can do it comfortably. I’ve already betrayed him once, and that was one time too many. Ask someone else, Master Skywalker. The gossipers can be useful sometimes.”

Luke smiled a little wistfully. “I’m afraid the times when people were willing to gossip with me are long gone.”

Octa, who was already poised to leave, shrugged apologetically. “I still can’t.”

“That’s all right. Thanks anyway.”

After she left, he just sat there, staring at the opposite wall with unseeing eyes, trying to comprehend why the notion that Kyp could be weak always came as a surprise. Of all people, he had been the one who definitely should have known better than to take Kyp’s stability for granted.

Well, at least this time he’d received an honest and square warning, and he’d better not repeat his past mistakes. Waiting for the problem to disappear hadn’t worked before; he had no doubt it was not going to work now, either. And if he let Kyp fall again, this time it would be his, and only his, fault. No fool like twice fooled.

 

***

 

Instead of going back to his apartment and facing Mara’s wrath, Luke went to the medical ward. Mara could wait; he could make a damn good guess about what had set her off this time, and talking with her was not going to be easy, and it was not going to be simple, and, most importantly, it was not going to be short. There was something else he needed to do first.

Cilghal’s domain had a comfortable, homey feeling to it, so uncustomary for a medical establishment. But then, the Calamari Jedi Master had never been an average doctor.

She stood up and greeted him with a respectful nod upon his entering, abandoning whatever she had been studying on her holoscreen. “Master Skywalker?” she asked, with a hint of worry in her voice. It was understandable - he had never been a frequent visitor to the place.

“I need you to do something for me, Cilghal,” Luke said, quickly going to the heart of the issue. “I need you to run a complete health check on Kyp, but you have to do it in such a way that he won’t notice he’s being singled out. I don’t know, probably you should tell him I ordered health checks on all Jedi on Mon Cal... or anything else you can think of.”

“The health checks wouldn’t hurt in any case,” Cilghal answered calmly. “Jedi aren’t immune to stress-induced illnesses, and since the war is currently more or less on standstill, it might be a good idea to do it now. But why Kyp?”

“When did you see him the last time?” Luke answered with his own question.

“Three days ago, at the Council meeting,” she said. “You were there as well.”

“Have you noticed anything strange about him?”

The Calamari’s high, sloped forehead wrinkled slightly. “No. Although he looked tired, but that hardly can be constituted as unusual.”

Luke sighed. “I take it, you haven’t looked at him through the Force, then. Do it the next time; you might find something that can be constituted as unusual. That’s not all, however. I sparred with him today, with dual sabers. He lost six bouts in a row.”

The Jedi healer’s big, protruding eyes flashed orange. “Now, this is unusual, I agree.”

“According to Knight Ramis,” continued Luke, “he also hasn’t slept well in at least a month. She also reported that he’s appearing moody and withdrawn. Every one of these in itself might not be alarming, but put together...”

“I understand you, Master Skywalker. When do you want it done?”

Luke shrugged. “Yesterday? I’m serious, Cilghal. The last thing I want is to have a repeat performance of what happened back on Yavin 4.”

“Kyp is not the same man as he was then,” she answered reproachfully. “I don’t think that what you fear is possible, even if he is going to break down.”

“I know that, Cilghal,” Luke said, somewhat chastened. “But if he _just_ gets himself killed because of sheer exhaustion, it will be even worse, don’t you agree? I’m not willing to lose him.”

“Me either,” the other Master answered seriously. “I’ll do everything I can.”

“Thank you. And try to talk to him, please. You’re one of his oldest friends, probably he’ll open up to you.” He smiled crookedly. “Miracles happen, after all.”

“Master Skywalker,” Cilghal said thoughtfully. “Have you considered that _you_ might be Kyp’s problem? One of them, at least?”

Luke froze. “How so?”

The red-skinned Jedi sat back in her chair and looked at him intently with her enormous, luminescent orange eyes. “Placing him on the Council was a good way to give due acknowledgment to the Jedi Master Durron. But have you thought about giving the same recognition to your friend Kyp? He’s still your friend, isn’t he?”

“Of course he is,” Luke answered incredulously. “You know that.”

“No,” Cilghal answered calmly. “Actually, I don’t. You have been practically ignoring him since the beginning of the war, and for some time before that.” She raised her broad, big hand to forestall his objections. “I didn’t mean the official relationship between two Jedi Masters. You have always been much more than that for Kyp. ‘Positive regard’ isn’t an empty word, Master Skywalker. Think about that, please.”

“I will,” he promised.

“Thank you.” She bowed, politely but firmly dismissing him.

Luke walked out in a haze, not really registering where he was heading. He trusted his instincts to guide him to some place where he could just sit down and think. Fragments and snatches of all the meetings and conversations he had had with Kyp during the last five years were playing a continuous loop in his mind. The Jedi meetings, their arguments, him assigning Kyp the tasks to do at the beginning of the war, before Kyp decided he would be better off on his own. Kyp reporting back – always precise, always laconic in the extreme.

When had he started to be like that? When exactly had Kyp’s wry, often colorful accounts transmuted to this sterile military accuracy? After their first clash over how this war should be fought? Or before? He didn’t even remember, and that made him shiver. Once again he had lost control of the situation, and allowed something very vital and very important to slip through his fingers, quietly and imperceptibly. And once again it happened because he had been afraid.

A discreet ‘beep’ of a waiter droid brought his awareness back. He was sitting in an already familiar small café, not far from the Council chambers and other governmental facilities. It was half-empty; there weren’t a lot of strangers at this level, and discreet and efficient security personnel made sure that various members of the new galactic government and Senate wouldn’t be bothered by strangers.

Luke didn’t like it, but it was exactly what he needed now – a safe, quiet place to sit down and think. No one was likely to bother him here; if nothing else, the stink of sweat and his disheveled appearance would guarantee that.

“Juma juice,” he said to the droid. “And a shroom steak on Tusken bread.” Luke wasn’t hungry yet, but he thought he had better eat while he still had the chance. Mara wasn’t likely to let him have a peaceful dinner upon returning home. Chewing the food with much less attention than it deserved, Luke continued turning Cilghal’s idea around in his mind, finding it more and more likely with each passing minute.

Many, many years ago, ironically, on Dathomir, a woman, who eventually became the Queen of sixty-three planets, had given him a crash course on one of the Universe’s most ancient weapons – the longbow. “Always unstring the bow,” she had said, amongst other bits of knowledge. “If you don’t, the constant strain will ruin both the bow and the bowstring, wearing them out slowly, but surely, and one day when you need them most, they’ll just snap in your hands. And the stronger the bow, the more often you need to let it rest, because the strain on it is greater, too.” What he hadn’t understood at the time was that the same rule could be applied to people, as well.

“He thinks he’s supposed to be the reliable one,” Octa had said. These weren’t empty words; Luke knew that probably better than anyone else. Kyp’s reliability was another thing he had got used to take for granted, which surely would have surprised any bystanders who knew nothing but the bare bones of his and Kyp’s history. Luke, however, knew the truth.

Months ago, at their first public knighting ceremony, carried by a fit of Force-induced inspiration, he named his niece, Jaina, the Sword of the Jedi. What he hadn’t realized then was that the metaphor was incomplete.

Because in the world of ancient battle paraphernalia which became a staple for poetic allusions and heraldic images, the Sword had never been alone. There had always been another thing, the second part to the sacred pair – the Shield. Attack and defense, strike and guard, one without the other would always be only a part of the whole. And when the Sword failed, when the task became too overwhelming for it to carry on, when the enemies were too plentiful and the losses too unbearable, the Shield was there to cover it and help it back to safety.

What he tended to forget, Luke thought wryly, was that both the Sword and the Shield that the Order had been so lucky to have in such hard times, were appallingly and reassuringly human. And the things Teneniel Djo had said to him, eons ago, applied to them, as much as to anyone else. Jaina, well... Jaina had Kyp to lean on when the strain of being what she was became unbearable. But Kyp didn’t have anyone. After all, one can lean only on something that is stronger than he is, or at least just as strong. How many people in the Universe fit that requirement?

He was one of these people, and he failed at the task.

An insistent beeping interrupted Luke’s musings. “Skywalker,” he said resignedly into the dark plastic of his comlink.

“If you think you can outwait me, farmboy,” Mara’s voice told him with a hefty dose of sarcasm, “think again.”

“I’ll be at home in half an hour,” Luke answered, ignoring Mara’s displeasure. A public cantina wasn’t the best place to get into a fight with your spouse over a comm.

“You’d better, or I’ll come to get you,” his wife said dryly, and closed the connection.

Luke sighed again. He really should have cleared up this subject with Mara long ago, instead of just waiting for it to dissolve on its own. Would he ever gain enough wisdom to learn how to discern which problems the passive approach was going to work with, and which it wasn’t? He had been afraid to take an active stance in this war – and it almost led to a complete disaster. He had been afraid to talk about his past, and Mara’s issues with it – and it seemed that another disaster, this time a personal one, was waiting for him with impatience. One of those days he was going to figure out when the fear of aggression was becoming a trigger for aggression. One of those days...

When he closed the door to their small, humid apartment behind him, Mara was standing before the round window with her back to him. She didn’t turn. The turquoise light, filtered through meters of water, outlined her silhouette, creating an interesting effect on her hair. It appeared almost black now, with a muted purple hue. Luke wondered briefly why he was even noticing these details at such a moment.

“Old love never dies, Skywalker?” she asked, with brittle quiet.

Luke didn’t even try to pretend he hadn’t understood her. “I never loved Kyp,” he answered honestly. “Not in the sense you seem to imply.” He deliberately kept himself as open to her as possible, hoping she would feel his sincerity. “Mara... I love you more than I’ve loved anyone else in my life. But does it mean I’m not allowed to have any other attachments?”

She turned to him, arms firmly crossed on her chest. “So you do admit you love him.”

“I always did, in a way,” he said evenly. “Probably even from day one. It just took me a lot of time to recognize.”

Mara snorted. “You were besotted by him, Skywalker. From day one, all right. I hoped you had gotten over it, especially after everything he put you through, but it seems that I was wrong.”

“I was enamored with his potential at first,” Luke agreed. “Besotted probably is indeed the correct word. But it was just that – I was in love with the idea of having such a student. I never bothered to look past it, to see the person he was, not just a vessel for a huge amount of Force aptitude that I could shape according to my ideas. I paid for that mistake. Despite whatever you and other people think, I don’t consider him guilty for his fall.” She made a movement, as if to interrupt him, and he held out his hand, for once letting the weight of authority he had accumulated through the years slip through. “No, Mara. By taking on Kyp, I took responsibility for far more than just training him, and I neglected it, and you know that. Not intentionally, of course, but it doesn’t make my negligence any less criminal. I should have known better. _I_ wasn’t sixteen years old at the time.”

He rubbed his forehead tiredly. “We seem to deviate here. Just to clear the subject – yes, I do love Kyp. In many ways. As a student, the best one I’ve ever had. As a friend, one of the very few I have who doesn’t have a problem with seeing me for who I am, and accepting it. As a child, too, in some sense, and I think I already told you that once. As just an amazing being, after all, one who managed to survive everything that life has thrown at him, without breaking down under the impossible weight. But romantic love doesn’t have any part in it, Mara. He’s not any competition for you, and he never has been.”

Mara suddenly stepped forward, and her strong, hard fingers dug into his shoulders. “You’re a lousy liar, Skywalker. I felt you this morning, and I felt your lust. And I’m pretty kriffin’ sure you weren’t thinking about me at the time. Do you know how many times I saw you dreaming of him? Do you know how many times I caught the images from your memories? You, making love to him with an abandon and intensity I never, ever, felt being directed at me! Tell me, how long this affair was going on? Why did you break up with him? Or was it him who left you? Was I just a cover for you? Or a convenient substitute?” She was shaking him now, with her fingers digging into his shoulders painfully, as if wanting nothing more than to throttle him, and refraining from it just because she wanted to hear the answer. “Tell me, damn you!”

Of course, Luke had never hoped he would be able to completely hide his past involvement with Kyp from Mara. He never even tried to. Their connection had been way too strong for such an attempt. Somehow, though, he hoped she would be able not only to see, but, sooner or later, to understand – and that was another mistake. He presumed, instead of asking and answering, and, obviously, Mara constructed a very incorrect picture out of the bits of insight she had been able to gain. _An affair?_ She thought they had _an affair?_

“I can do better,” he told her. “I can show you. I’m sorry I haven’t done this earlier, Mara. What you think is almost totally wrong, but I can’t prove it in any way other than letting you take a walk through my memories, step by step. Do you want it?”

Mara was surprised enough to let go of him completely and make a step back. “Oh, you bet I do,” she answered, after a brief pause. “If I’m going to break up with you today, I damn well want to know what I’m doing it for.”

Luke felt punched in the gut. Had it gone that far? She was the one who knew him like no other, probably not even Leia. How could she doubt him in such a fundamental way, after everything they had been through? How was it possible, that with their bond, she was unable to look into his soul and see how deep his commitment to her was?

He had often heard that love made people blind. Apparently, the same was true for jealousy.

“One thing, Mara. I don’t want to hide anything from you. I really don’t. Please believe me. But what I’m going to show you concerns not only me. There are some things about Kyp there that very few people know about, and for a very good reason. Promise me that no matter what your decision is, you’ll never use it against him. Give me your word, Mara.”

Her green eyes narrowed. “And what if I won’t?”

Luke felt tears starting to gather somewhere inside his eye sockets, putting, it seemed, a ton of pressure on his brain. “Then I can’t show it to you. I really want you to understand, badly, but gaining your trust by betraying Kyp’s would be just exchanging one regret for another.”

Mara’s face softened a bit, and she covered it by rolling her eyes in a show of annoyance. “Fine. You have my word.”

“Thanks.” He took her hands and gently placed her fingers over his temples. “Just reach out to me. And please, Mara, don’t break the connection until I do. I don’t think I would be able to do it more than once.”

Looking back was hard. It had been a long time. Luke felt very far removed from that frustrated, clueless man he had been then. However, it was absolutely necessary that he recreated the events exactly, so Mara would be able to understand what had been driving him, the desperation and helplessness that gave birth to the fervor and intensity she was so envious about. He needed her to see the unbelievable generosity Kyp displayed by accepting something that was just shy of a rape, and showing him a way out of the trap that he drove himself into. He needed her to see the Kyp she never knew, even if the cause for that was mostly her own prejudice.

That was the Kyp he knew very well, though, this affectionate friend and staunch ally, a light-hearted, charming being that had the ability to brighten people’s lives by just being around. Only now Luke started to understand how much he missed this side of Kyp, which had not been on display for a while.

Or, probably, it had been, but not for him. And he allowed his sorrow to leak out to Mara as well. It was his mistake, no doubt about that, but it was her unyielding animosity toward Kyp that had been the cause, and he wanted her to understand how much he had missed just because of her inability to give up jealousy and old grudges. How much _she_ had missed.

Luke finished his recollection with his meeting with Kyp on the balcony in the morning. Even if he wanted to continue it past that, he wouldn't have been able; such a deep delving into the old memories required a lot of effort, not to mention transferring them to someone else, and he was exhausted. He gently disengaged his mind from Mara’s, and just continued to stand there with his eyes closed, breathing hard, trying to quell the emotions that the memories had awakened.

When he finally looked into his wife’s eyes, they were distant and unfocused, with the pupils dilated so wide that they appeared almost black. Then she took two steps back and dropped herself into an armchair, with hands hanging limply by her sides.

“Go,” she said in a small voice. “Please, just go.”

Luke’s heart sank down and started to throb painfully. “Is that it?” he asked in a hoarse, hollow voice.

“Oh?” That caused her to startle. “No, Luke, no. I’m not kicking you out for good... at least yet.” She smiled bleakly. “But I need to think, and I need to be alone for that. I think it’d be better if you slept somewhere else tonight. Do you understand?”

He nodded, relieved. “I do.” Luke. She called him Luke. It was a good sign. Mara would come around; if nothing else, he could always count on her innate sense of fairness to guide her through.

He slept on one of the beds in the infirmary that night, thankful for Cilghal’s silent tact and the fact that the suite had been devoid of patients.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: some swearing and non-descriptive references to sexual abuse of a minor.

“...unfortunately, as of now, the Senate doesn’t support our proposition for the centralized solution of the refugee problem. That doesn’t leave us with many options. The Senate declines any distribution of monetary resources and supplies to the refugee camps – mostly on the grounds that such a distribution can be easily abused. So the things we can deal with now, with the possible approval from the Senate, are medical control, and intelligence and counter-intelligence scanning. Releqy, would you, please?”

“Certainly.” The golden-furred Caamasi stood up. “Well, as the Chief of State just said, there isn’t a lot we can do in present circumstances. However, we managed to think of some measures, which I’m going to present now. We hope that the Jedi might be able to help us with some of them. ”

“We’ll do whatever we can, Madame Minister of State,” Cilghal responded from her position in a small, quietly bubbling pool, a couple of meters from the oval table where the other members of the High Council were seated.

Luke couldn’t see her – he was sitting almost directly in front of the pool. He didn’t have to have the benefit of sight, though, to feel her genuine interest in the subject, and her attentive alertness. At the moment, he envied her. Because there was no way Luke was going to give the subject the attention due to it right now, no matter how guilty he felt about that.

He was still in turmoil. Mara hadn’t called him this morning, and when he called her, he got only the automated ‘busy, please call later’ message. Their apartment, when he got to it, had been empty. Luke panicked at first, but finding all Mara’s and his belongings and clothes on their proper places allayed his anxiety a bit. She wasn’t leaving him, nor was she kicking him out – yet. Probably she had just been gone for another bout of work with Intelligence division, as simple as that. But the fact that he could doubt the certainty of Mara’s continuous presence in his life was terrifying.

And seeing the cause for this crisis in his personal life just across the table wasn’t helping Luke’s concentration at all. Kyp, of course, was quite unaware of the distress he had been causing Luke; in fact, Luke doubted that Kyp was in a state to be aware of anything short of a death threat right now. He was sitting there, leaning back in his chair with his shoulders hunched and head ducked, nursing a cup of double stimcaf in both hands, looking for all it was worth like he wished it was a triple. Kyp had rarely been able to hide what he was feeling – his facial features and body language were just too eloquent for that. And now his face and posture screamed the question ‘what am I doing here?’ as surely as if he had it written in big fluorescent letters on a holoscreen above his head. He attracted some strange looks, but so far no one had called him on his obvious distraction.

Luke couldn’t really blame him. The new Council room was beautiful and comfortable; the natural, diffused lights, the soft, flowing curves of the walls and furniture, and a muted sound of running water were somniferous at the best of times. And today surely couldn’t qualify as such, either for him or for Kyp. Releqy A’Kla’s quiet, melodious voice wasn’t helping, either.

He knew he should at least try to pay attention, and he made an honest effort to concentrate. It was almost painful, but for a short time he could not only hear Releqy, but actually understand what she was talking about.

A Force touch brushed upon his presence, conveying reassurance and a tinge of sympathy. It also held permission to relax, a sort of unvoiced ‘don’t worry, I’ll get it’ message, and Luke smiled gratefully. Cilghal. And, judging by the way Kyp quickly looked up, right at the same moment, and the way his body slightly relaxed afterwards, she had decided to cover for both of them.

Luke hadn’t even thought of refusing Cilghal’s courtesy. Her judgment in that area was better than his, anyway.

Kyp’s eyes began to get glassy and unfocused and, unable to resist his exhaustion, he propped his forehead on one hand, letting the unruly curly wisps that, as usual, found their way out of confinement, to fall forward. It helped to mask the fact that his eyes started to close, slowly, but surely.

He would let him sleep, Luke decided. It was better for Kyp to catch even so little as fifteen or twenty minutes of sleep now, and wake up in time for Ayddar Nylykerka’s part of the briefing, than not sleep at all. From past experience, Luke knew that even such an infinitesimal nap would be enough to keep the younger man awake for hours afterwards. He looked around to see who else noticed. Curiously, only Cal Omas seemed to pay attention to Kyp’s dazed state, but if the faint lines around the Chief of State’s mouth were anything to judge by, he wasn’t pleased at all.

 _That makes two of us, Cal,_ thought Luke.

Finally, Releqy’s presentation seemed to come to an end. Luke heard a splash from behind him, and then Cilghal’s calm voice said: “That was very interesting, Madame Minister of State, but, frankly, I don’t see how we can help you with this. Right now we have only two accomplished healers, myself and my student Tekli, and both of us are very busy with other projects.”

“We weren’t counting on your direct participation, Master Cilghal,” the golden-furred Caamasi answered. “Even if you could, two healers, no matter how accomplished they are, wouldn’t make any difference in solving a problem of this magnitude. What we were counting on, though, is your take on things. Jedi have the benefit of looking at a problem from a different point of view; therefore, you might be able to find a solution we overlooked. Here,” and she put a handful of data chips on the table, “is the information that I gave you, plus a lot of details I had to omit from this presentation due to the time restrictions. I want to ask each of you to take one, and look it over. Any input, no matter how crazy it might seem, would be welcome.” Her long, beak-liked nose dropped, a Caamasi equivalent of a smile. “I’d even say the crazier the better, since the traditional approaches haven’t been very productive so far.”

She started to slide the chips toward the Jedi one by one, and each of them in turn had to stretch forward and take the one intended for him or her from the polished surface. All of them except Kyp, who hadn’t even attempted to move.

Luke gave the younger Master a slight nudge through the Force, hoping it would be enough to wake him up. He saw that Kyp’s eyes snapped open, but instead of moving, Kyp just barely turned his free hand, and the last data chip slid into it, as if moved by a magnet.

Luke blinked. They never used the Force during those meetings. There wasn’t any need, and, besides, it tended to make the non-Jedi members of the Council uncomfortable. What the kriff Kyp was trying to hide – the fact that he was unable to stand up? Luke disregarded this idea. Kyp couldn’t possibly be that exhausted. Most probably, he was just out of sorts badly enough to go for the easiest way. He was one of the few Jedi whose control of the Force was so natural and effortless that going for it would be the first reaction. But that was quite disturbing, too.

However, by the time Director of Fleet Intelligence Nylykerka took the stand, Kyp seemed to be more awake. He even started asking and answering questions. Luke had suspected for a long time that Kyp actually had his own private intelligence network – no one would have managed what he had been doing, before and during the war, without proper reconnaissance – and his questions, indeed, suggested more than average familiarity with the subject. The new galactic government was trying to allay the situation with refugees by building new supply and armament factories and employing the homeless, jobless masses of people. It was a good idea, and a good effort, but with it, the problem of Yuuzhan Vong infiltration of refugee camps, either directly or through the Peace Brigade, was becoming more pressing than ever. The new YVH droids could filter out the Vong; however with the Peace Brigade members, that technology was useless.

Kyp was right, though; the only way they could help would be at the final stage, after Intelligence did the bulk of the work of outlining the most endangered areas and narrowing down the circle of potential suspects. They just didn’t have enough people for more extensive participation; in fact, even minimal participation in Intelligence’s efforts would be hard to manage. Hard, but not impossible.

Finally, the meeting came to an end. Luke wasn’t surprised to see Kyp be the first one out of the door. He almost went after him; but no, neither of them was ready to talk yet. Kyp would just dismiss his concerns, and Luke didn’t yet have enough information to argue with the younger Master. So far, he hadn’t seen anything that couldn’t have been chalked up to simple tiredness, and his gut feeling about Kyp’s problem being much more serious than that, was just that – a gut feeling.

Cal Omas stopped Luke just outside of the door with a hand on his shoulder. “Problems?” he asked quietly. “You looked distracted at the meeting.”

Luke shrugged. “I haven’t had much to contribute. I’m not a specialist in either medicine or intelligence work.”

Omas sighed. “Actually, I hoped that...”

“Kyp!” A joyous exclamation somewhere farther along the hallway was loud enough to be heard where they stood, and Luke quickened his steps. The voice was unfamiliar, and he wanted to see who was calling to his former student with such obvious pleasure and assumption of long familiarity.

It was a big, powerfully built middle-aged man, probably ten or fifteen years older than Luke, and at least a head taller. He grabbed the slender Jedi Master and spun him around in an exuberant hug.

To Luke’s astonishment, Kyp, who was usually pretty touch-conscious, just laughed and hugged the man back with obvious delight. “You old reprobate! What are you doing here?”

“You think you’re the only one who’s high and mighty now?” the older man asked with a smile, after letting Kyp free. “I’m a Senator, Kyp.”

“Whoa! How long?”

“Two weeks. Two months, actually, but it took me some time to get here. Sorry I haven’t tried to find you sooner. First weeks in the office are frantic, you know?”

Kyp’s answering smile was bleak. “Oh, I know.”

The Senator frowned suddenly and spun the Jedi around, so the light from one of the big oval windows fell directly on his face. “Gods above and beyond, Kyp! What in the name of Alderaan’s grasslands you have been doing to yourself? You look like hell, son.”

The Jedi shrugged. “Just tired. It’s no big deal.”

“Don’t give me that bantha shit. I’ve seen you ‘just tired’ before, and you’re at least five kilograms and two weeks of sleepless nights past that point.” A melodious bell sounded, indicating the end of a Senate session break, and the man cursed under his breath. “I’ve got to go.” He dug in his pockets and fished out a plastic info-card. “Listen, give me a call later, and don’t you even think of ‘forgetting’ it. The invitation to dinner still stands, and if you don’t show up, Taira will hunt you down. Do you really want that?”

Kyp shuddered exaggeratedly. “Force forbid.”

“Settled, then. Dinner at twenty hundred sharp. See you.” And he left with quick, long strides, leaving behind one Jedi Master with a rather bemused and silly smile on his face.

Then Kyp turned, and his gaze fell upon Luke. The smile vanished, as if wiped out, and the now-customary closed expression settled upon Kyp’s features in a heartbeat. Then he shrugged slightly, as if dismissing the fact that Luke saw this whole exchange as insignificant, turned around, and left.

“Bravo,” Cal said quietly from behind Luke. “Finally, someone who can manhandle Kyp Durron. You should probably ask for lessons.”

“Who was that?” Luke asked with amazement.

“Dohar Irsenna, formerly of Alderaan, Senator of Argovia. He’s going to be trouble, Luke.”

The name took Luke a couple of seconds for him to recognize, but when it registered, everything became much clearer. So that was the man who had almost become Kyp’s father-in-law, and who continued to be his friend even after the engagement was broken. In Luke’s opinion, it characterized him rather positively.

He turned to the Chief of State. “Trouble? Why?”

“What do you know of Argovia?”

“Unpleasant weather. Rich in minerals and ores. Had been nationalized by the Empire, then de-nationalized by the New Republic, don’t remember exactly when. That’s about it. What did I miss?”

Cal smiled a bit cynically. “All the important stuff. They are very wealthy, and becoming wealthier with each month of the war, since a lot of strategically important metals and minerals aren’t mined anywhere else. They don’t have a lot of refugees, either, and in the last two weeks Irsenna made it quite clear that they are not going to support any additional taxation for the centralized refugee resettlement. However, that doesn’t mean they are parsimonious. The mining corporations hand out huge sums for charity, but they are doing it directly, avoiding the usual bureaucratic channels.”

“That makes sense,” Luke noticed neutrally.

“On a certain level, undoubtedly. Irsenna claims that the purpose of that is to neutralize the threat of corruption and to avoid the money being redirected to feed the bureaucrats instead of the objects of donation. And that’s certainly a valid concern. But it also makes Argovia a magnet for any politician who is interested in a donation for his people, and as you very well know, it’s easily half of the Senate. They are practically lining up at the door to his office, and it has been all of two weeks, Luke! Two weeks, and he’s already one of the major players.

“And that’s not all. He’s one of Fior Rodan’s personal friends – they go back to the time before the war, and Irsenna already made it clear that their political views are very close. That’s another voice in a camp that’s strong enough even without it. And now we learn that in addition to being friends with Rodan, he’s also chummy enough with Durron to call him ‘son’. I don’t know about you, but such a combination makes me shiver.”

Luke understood Cal’s concern. The linking of two oppositions – one within the Senate, represented by Fior Rodan, and one within the Jedi Order, represented by Kyp Durron... yes, it definitely had a potential for trouble.

“I see,” he said to the Chief of State. “But I don’t think you should worry about that. Kyp is not likely to start playing political games.”

“I’m not afraid they’d start conspiring behind our backs,” Omas answered, looking at Luke almost pityingly. “I’m afraid they might be straightforward.”

 _I’ll never understand politicians_ , thought Luke, walking through the maze of hallways and corridors to his apartment. What exactly Cal meant by this seemingly self-contradictory statement? He sighed. He wished he could have asked Leia about that, but it wasn’t a question to be brought up over a comm call and therefore, it would have to wait until she was back on Mon Calamari. Probably Mara would be able to figure it out...

Luke’s eyebrows knitted. That is, if Mara would be there. If she wouldn’t throw him out. If she would deign to talk to him at all. He still hoped she would work her way through the haze of jealousy and animosity she had built around her perceptions, but he wasn’t optimistic enough to hope it would be a quick process.

 

***

 

The nondescript metallic door slid open, and Luke inhaled briskly in mixed relief and anxiety. Mara was home.

She was curled on a couch, covered with a plaid coverlet, sleeping. The muted blue light from the window made her beautiful, strong face appear pale and pinched, and Luke frowned, looking at her more closely. No, it wasn’t just the effect of the lighting. There were dim circles around her eyes, and the faint, almost unnoticeable wrinkles around her mouth and eyes were definitely more pronounced now. She hadn’t had much sleep this night, if any at all.

He pulled one of the armchairs closer to the couch and sat in it quietly, looking at his wife. He would wait. This talk was coming almost nine years later than it should have; what was another couple of hours?

Luke leaned forward, looking at this much beloved face. He couldn’t lose her, he just couldn’t. No matter what it would take, no matter how long it would take, he had to fight for her understanding. Because no matter how much he loved Mara, in the last day he had come to a realization that had been, obviously, as long in coming as was this talk. He couldn’t, shouldn’t, sacrifice his relationships with other people, even for the sake of keeping the love of his life happy. In the end, the sorrow and confusion it created led to bitter regrets, and regrets could very well kill all the joy and love in his marriage, leading to the demise of the very reason he acquired them in the first place. This clash over Kyp hadn’t even been the first warning; he should have thought long ago why he was never able to talk with Mara about his past involvements properly. Granted, he’d never had a pressing reason to do that; none of them were present in his life now, some dead, some estranged. However, they were such a big part of his life, each of them – Gaeriel, Jem, Callista, Akanah – each having a hand in shaping Luke Skywalker into the man he was now. So why hadn’t he been able to talk with his wife and best friend about them?

 _And talk about all my mistakes and failures in those relationships?_

Luke sighed and propped his chin on his steepled fingers. Probably his inability to talk about them wasn’t entirely Mara’s fault.

He had to break this habit, though. Jem and Gaeriel were dead; Callista and Akanah – lost somewhere in the galaxy, most probably never to be met again. But Kyp, oh, Kyp was still here, and, thank the Force, still alive. And Luke wasn’t willing to add him to his already considerable list of people to mourn and mistakes to regret. Not anymore. There had been too much sorrow between them already.

He looked at Mara, again, like countless other times struck by her beauty, so full of strength and character. Once upon a time, many years ago, he had been willing to put his life on the line for a meager hope of gaining her respect and understanding. What had happened to them since then?

What had happened to _him_ , to be completely honest?

Luke ached to reach out and touch the gold-red silky mass of Mara’s hair, stroke it, bury his face in it and inhale the familiar, dear scent, but he didn’t feel he could afford this liberty anymore. The desire, however, was so strong that he had to close his eyes in order to quell the temptation.

When he opened them, they were met with a brilliant emerald look, still misted a bit by sleep’s haze.

“Hi,” he said quietly.

“Hi yourself.” She smiled, a tiny smile that lifted only one corner of her lips. “This is awkward.”

“It shouldn’t be.”

“Probably, but it is.”

They lapsed into a silence that finally became too much for Luke to bear. “So, what now?” he asked, lowering his clenched hands between his knees and fighting the urge to squeeze them there to suppress shudders that were a bare fraction of a second from coming, kept at bay only by his will.

Mara shrugged. “I have to give you that, farmboy – when you decide to go open, you dish out so much information that it’s hard not to drown in it.” She smiled, a tight-lipped, mirthless smile. “Having said that... I need more.”

Luke looked at her, a bit puzzled. “More?”

“Yes. I want the rest of the story. That was only the first night; what happened next?”

Luke glanced at her, surprised. “There wasn’t any ‘next’, Mara. I told you – your assumptions were way off. It was one night, no more... no less either, of course. Sometimes one night is more than enough to turn the course of your life.”

Mara looked at him with the eyes that suddenly became as hard and unyielding as gemstones. “I find it hard to believe. No one is that reticent. You want to tell me that you had a couple of orgasms strong enough to make you see stars the size of red giants, and you didn’t want to repeat the experience? Spare me, Skywalker.”

“I didn’t say I hadn’t wanted more. It wasn’t my choice.”

“He turned you down?”

Luke shrugged. “Not in so many words. Not in words at all, in fact. But yes, he made it abundantly clear. I was less than happy at first, you’re right about that. In my exaltation of a neophyte I hadn’t thought about consequences and complications...”

“What?!” Mara’s astonished question jerked him out of his narrative. “Luke, you were as much a virgin at this point as I was a social butterfly, that much I’m sure of!”

He laughed, more than a bit self-consciously. “Physically? No, of course not, although not by much. But mentally I was a classic case of retarded virginity, and a very messed-up case at that. I’m so glad you and I hadn’t gotten together earlier than we did, because I’d have blown up our relationship in less than a year, just like what happened with Callista.”

One red eyebrow lifted up. “Are you telling me she left you because of sex?”

Luke shrugged. “Having the benefit of hindsight, I think it was a big part of it, although not the sole reason. If our love life was good, it might have outweighed other problems... but it wasn’t. We were unable to create the same kind of intimacy, the unity in body and soul that you and I have, and that proved to be our downfall. She was continuously frustrated, I felt continuously guilty, and you know as well as I do what comes from guilt and frustration. I’m sure that by the end of it she was thinking she had been better off as a ghost. Callista lost her Force talents, took on another woman’s body – all in a hope to be able to love me in the way she wanted to – and if it would have been just a spiritual love, she might have spared herself the hassle. That was never a problem between us. But she wanted a lot more than that, and what she wanted I was unable to give her.”

Mara looked at him as if he was transforming into a Devaronian before her eyes. “I must be really easy to satisfy then,” she said acidly. “I wasn’t aware that you lacked anything in this department.”

“Love, you’re forgetting something. The first time you and I had sex came seven years after Callista and, more importantly, five years after Kyp managed to turn my whole outlook upside down in a single night, and I’d acquired a lot of experience since then. I’ve always been a diligent student.” He caught Mara’s unbelieving stare and lifted his eyebrows. “What? He did, I assure you, at least as far as sex and other bodily pleasures go.”

“I don’t understand it,” Mara said slowly. “What was it that you thought you lacked, and what did Kyp do to change it? I’m afraid you’ll have to spell it out for me, because I don’t see the life-altering importance of one admittedly spectacular fuck.”

He grimaced. “It’s not a subject I’m eager to discuss with my wife, but I’m going to give it a try. Want something to drink first?”

“Are you stalling, Skywalker?”

“Thanks for asking. I believe I am,” he answered wryly. “Can I ask you something?”

“Go, shoot.”

“How old you were when you first had sex?”

Mara’s eyebrows came together in contemplation. “About fifteen, I think. It was, in some sense, a part of my training, although I didn’t know it back then. Palpatine... took care that I had an open-minded attitude toward sex, and enough experience to make my cover as a courtesan believable, should the need arise. I never questioned why my instructors, both male and female, were always good-looking, and why many of them seemed not to have any reservations whatsoever about bedding me. Only a couple of years later, when I... grew too attached to one of them, I learned the truth.”

“What happened?” Luke asked softly.

“He just vanished. I hope Palpatine didn’t kill him; after all, he valued skilled servants. But I never saw him again,” Mara’s face cringed in a grimace of distaste, “and then your dear dad explained to me in a few well-chosen words that while I was free to bed whoever I want, I was allowed to be attached to one person only.” Mara swallowed the juice Luke had poured for her a minute ago in one gulp and put the glass on the low table beside the couch with a thump. “I thought we were supposed to talk about you, not me.”

Luke leaned forward and enfolded one of her white-skinned, small hands in both of his. “Whenever you want to talk...”

She smiled crookedly, then freed her hand gently. “I know, farmboy. Now, how about satisfying my curiosity in turn?”

He rotated his glass of tonic water in his hands. “I wonder if you know how apt that nickname really is.”

“Which one? Oh, ‘farmboy’?”

“Yes.” Luke put the glass on the table beside Mara’s. “Farmboy. Do you know anything about the life of a farmer on Tatooine, you, Mara Jade, Coruscanti child of the Imperial Palace?” He smiled, to take away any sting she could have perceived in his words, but he could feel that, despite all his efforts, the smile had been too bitter to soothe anything. “Will you laugh or feel pity for me when I tell you that I was thirty the first time I found out what sex with someone other than my own hand felt like?”

Mara gaped at him, stunned into silence. It took her a good half of a minute to close her mouth and swallow, hard. “The latter, probably,” she said a bit hoarsely. “If I was capable of this feeling toward you, that is. But, Luke... how? I can’t understand it. What the kriff were Tatooine girls, terminally blind?”

“Not blind. Just different standards. I guess it’s another example of that ‘survival of the fittest’ theory. Someone with white skin and light hair is less likely to survive in a desert, so the common tastes run toward tall, dark types. Me, being even shorter than some girls, not to mention boys, with my blue eyes and sandy hair... well, let’s just say I never had any warm feelings toward the nickname my dear peers gave me.”

“Which was?”

“Wormie.”

Mara looked at him in astonishment. “You’re joking.”

“I wish I was. Not even my piloting skills could have turned me into something close to desirable for the local girls... or boys, for that matter. Biggs Darklighter was one of the very few who paid me at least some attention. In retrospect, I guess I did have a crush on him, but...” Luke shrugged. “I was naive and inexperienced enough not to realize what it was. I thought what I felt for him was just friendship. Actually, I hadn’t understood the exact nature of that friendship until my encounter with Kyp. Before that I honestly thought I couldn’t be attracted to a man sexually – and don’t even ask me how many ‘friendships’ of that sort I experienced between Tatooine and then. Force,” he exclaimed with disgust, “looking back, I can’t understand how I could have been so stupid!”

His wife arched an eyebrow. “Is this your oh so subtle way of telling me you prefer men?”

Luke stared at her in disbelief. “This is from someone who’d told me about her trysts with female instructors not fifteen minutes ago. You know it’s not that simple, Mara. If you want a definite answer – no, I don’t prefer men. I don’t think I really have a preference, now. I did my best to get rid of it along with other prejudices, when I realized where they were leading me.”

“Just how many prejudices are you talking about?”

He shrugged. “A lot. Tatooine is a harsh world, and it doesn’t leave a lot of space or time for frivolities. Life is hard, and having a child without both parents providing for him is very difficult, and no family is eager to have a bastard to care for, so sex before marriage is firmly discouraged. Very firmly. Same sex relationships are considered something abhorrent, unnatural, and tolerated only if they are kept very, very hush-hush. Sex is a necessity, not something that you do for pleasure, and marriages are rarely made based on love; it’s more a matter of convenience, of joining resources to survive and to have children. Idyllic this life is certainly not. Why do you think I was so eager to get out of there and never look back? My family wasn’t rich, and I knew that my chances of ever getting married were very close to nothing. And I did want to... well, probably not necessarily to get married, but I did want to love and be loved, even if I had no idea what it meant in reality. But when I did get out, everything started to happen so quickly. I virtually became a star of the Alliance in a matter of days, and that was too much, too soon. I wasn’t ready for the attention I was getting. When I understood that I had no idea how to talk with all those smart, bold, emancipated girls who wanted to bed a hero, much less what to do if I found enough guts to say ‘yes’, I got scared. Really, badly scared, so much that I suppressed it – very successfully, I have to admit. It was easier to imagine that I was so in love with Leia that I didn’t even want to look at anyone else, that I was a ‘no sex without love’ kind of guy. Wedge and others teased the life out of me for that, but it still was much more preferable to having my ineptitude become the hot topic of talk around the entire Rebel Alliance. But I outsmarted myself, unfortunately. I believed in it.”

“Believed that you were in love with Leia?” Mara asked calmly.

Luke stood suddenly, turning to their makeshift bar with its assortment of non-alcoholic drinks and one lonely bottle of Churban brandy, Talon Karrde’s present, given to them after the victory on Ebaq 9. To his own surprise, he found himself pulling the tight cork out without the benefit of an extractor. He usually refrained from using his prosthetic hand to its full strength, well aware of the impression it made on people, but right now he really needed a drink.

The red-brown, heady smelling liquid splashed into a glass, and he gulped the strong spirit without appreciating its famed taste. “Do you have to be that detached, Mara?” he asked hoarsely. “It’s my life we’re talking about, not a holo flick!”

He heard a noise from behind, a soft, rustling sound of fabric on fabric, and then two quick steps. Two strong hands hugged him around the shoulders and the familiar warmth of Mara’s body pressed into his back. “I thought it might be easier on you like that. I’m sorry, Luke.”

He turned within her embrace and leaned his forehead into the crook of her neck and shoulder, hands circling her waist of their own volition. “I’m sorry too,” he whispered, breathing her familiar scent in. “I’m sorry I haven’t told you all this earlier, and I’m sorry it created so much misunderstanding between us. I guess I’m still not sure how exactly this whole relationship thing works.”

He heard a slightly shocked laugh rumbling through the warm neck he leaned into. “You and me both, Skywalker. You and me both.” Then she released him. “Pour me some of that brandy, too, since you already opened it. And, Luke... you don’t have to tell me the rest, if it makes you that miserable. I don’t really have to know.”

“No, Mara, that’s the problem. You have to, because I want you to understand what Kyp really means to me, and how can I explain that if you don’t know the history? I’m so tired of this animosity between you two,” he sighed quietly.

“Is he that important to you?”

Luke glanced at her serious, slightly gloomy face. “Let me put it like this. If something happens with Kyp that I could have prevented, but didn’t, just because I was afraid to make you jealous, I’ll have a very hard time forgiving myself, and I doubt I ever will.”

“He’s a big boy, Skywalker,” Mara answered, but Luke noticed that her answer lacked its usual hard-edged conviction.

“Of course he is. But even big boys need help from time to time, don’t I know that! He was there for me when my life was on a very precipitous brink, and I’d like to do the same for him if I can.”

“You already did, Luke. You’re even, at the very least.”

He gave her a brief, sideway glance, the wide lips twisting in a grimace she had trouble to read. “Are we supposed to _count_?” And that was something Mara had no answer for.

She covered her discomfiture by taking her glass and taking a sip of the strong, fragrant spirit. “Anyway, if you want to continue, let’s continue. You were talking about being in love with Leia.”

Luke returned to the chair, looking a bit unfocused. “Well, I don’t know if I can call it being in love. Adoration would be probably a better word. But, ultimately, it wasn’t about Leia. I started to think about sex as something too profound to be sullied by even a bit less than a great, all-encompassing love, and as something that would just come naturally when I did encounter such love. On Tatooine, sex was something very...” he stumbled, unable to express his feelings.

“Mundane?” Mara supplied the word.

“Yes, thanks. Mundane. And I didn’t want mundane. I think the word ‘romantic’ doesn’t even begin to cover my outlook at that time.”

His wife laughed. “You’re a born idealist, Luke. I’m not surprised at all. For you it was probably normal.”

He grimaced. “Well, my body didn’t think it was normal. But I was way too busy for quite a long time to notice. Besides, it seemed that the fates just disliked the notion of me having a love affair that would last past a couple of months and a couple of kisses. Gaeriel couldn’t have a relationship with me, and Jem died even before I was able to figure out if there was a love to be found. You...” He smirked. “Well, you weren’t exactly eager to explore the possibilities, were you? I think I loved you even then, another case of so-called friendship that I named so for the lack of a better word. What we had didn’t exactly fit into the pattern I imagined for my great love.” He smiled sheepishly in answer to his wife’s ironic smirk. “You were so angry about me dreaming of Kyp, but do you know how many times I dreamed of you, waking up in the middle of the night on the brink of a climax, or even past it, asking myself what the flarg is wrong with me, that I’m having such dreams about someone who’s just a friend?”

Mara’s bright green eyes swept over him with a very obvious and very carnal intent. “Skywalker, if you want to continue this talk, I suggest a change of theme. A couple more remarks like that and I’ll demand a live reconstruction.”

Luke smiled. That was his Mara. “Hold that thought. Some of them were... interesting.”

“Oh?” Mara’s eyes narrowed.

Luke colored slightly. “Remember that time you tied me to a tree on Myrkr?”

The redhead’s grin became positively feral. “Oh, yes. I remember. I hope you do understand there’s no way I’m letting something like that slip. Continue your story... but make it quick.”

Luke chuckled, still a bit pink. “Yes, my Lady. To cut a long story short – I, um, mastered quite a few masturbation techniques in those years. For a time, it was enough. There was always this underlying tingle of frustration and dissatisfaction, but I didn’t recognize it as such. Then Callista happened upon me. Now, that was a perfect spiritual love at first sight, if you can say that about a ghost. I was overjoyed when we found her...”

Mara cringed. “I was there, in case you forgot.”

“...Right. But it had almost nothing to do with having her in the flesh as well as spirit. I was just insanely glad she hadn’t perished with the Eye of Palpatine. We returned to Yavin 4... and that was when problems started.

“To her credit, she hadn’t laughed at me when she found I was a virgin at my advanced age. But almost all her efforts to teach me something were in vain. I couldn’t quite reconcile my ideas about sex with the living and breathing reality of a woman in my bed. I was still expecting the passion just to come and sweep me along, without me really having to pay attention to what and how I was doing. By the time I started to get a more realistic grip on the whole sex issue, it was already too late. She felt inadequate, even without thinking she couldn’t be what I wanted in bed, as well. She probably thought it was her fault, and me... well, I just had no idea she was that upset and dissatisfied. I couldn’t feel her in the Force, and she never said anything. I knew something was wrong, I tried to make everything better, but before I was able to figure out what exactly the problem was, she’d left me.

“That hit me hard, as you remember. Losing her was bad enough all by itself, but what was worse, right at the time she left me, my body finally decided to get a clue and wake up. For two years after that I don’t even know what was worse – knowing that I’d lost the love of my life, as I thought of her back then, or battling the constant sexual frustration. You saw what it led to – I was unable to sleep by the end of it, I was unable to concentrate. And I couldn’t find a solution to this problem because I still wasn’t able to believe I could want to have sex with someone without falling madly in love first. You saw the rest. Looking back, I fully believe Kyp was right that night – if it hadn’t been him, all my frustration and lust might have come loose on someone who wouldn’t have been as generous and accepting as he was. Wouldn’t that have been an utter, complete disaster?”

“I can imagine the headlines,” Mara said slowly.

Luke rubbed his forehead. “Me too. That would have been the end – for the Order, for Leia, and, especially, for me. And make no mistake, Mara – that would have happened. Kyp gave me his consent that night, but, truth is, that first time around, I was a hairbreadth away from taking him without any regard for his willingness.”

“I know, Luke,” Mara said quietly. “I felt it.”

Luke lowered his eyes and swallowed hard. “What makes me absolutely nauseated is the thought that he’d have probably allowed me to do that, too. He’d have never fought me. I don’t think any of you understand how much he regrets what he did under Exar Kun’s influence, and battling me is one of his most bitter sorrows.”

Mara’s face assumed a somewhat disbelieving expression, but still she said nothing.

“He did more for me than just save me from raping someone out of sheer frustration,” Luke continued quietly. “He showed me the way out. Oh, of course, it took time – I’ve always been a bit slow on the uptake. I... I guess I was on the verge of fixating on him again, this time for a very different reason. He actually saw it sooner than I did, and detached himself – very subtly, so at first I didn’t notice he had been avoiding me. He did teach me something of what he’d learned on Dathomir, but it took only one instance when I started to think that pouncing on him might be a really good idea, and he found a reason for discontinuing the lessons. He hadn’t lied when he said he knew how to avoid unwanted attention. That was very wise of him; I still couldn’t separate sex and love with a big L in my mind, and in my confusion over what happened that night I was very likely to persuade myself I was in love with him. If he gave me any encouragement at all it would have been a very real possibility, and then I would have ended up in a whole different kind of mess, because a self-delusion of this scale can end up only in anger, and guilt, and frustration.

“And as for Kyp... he was starving for love at the time, and if I managed to convince him I really loved him, he just might have believed me, and that would have been a bigger disaster for him than for me. How did he manage to be so wise, to understand all that at his barely twenty years of age? I’ll never know.”

Mara shrugged. “You don’t really know his reasons. They might be different from what you think they were.”

Luke looked at his wife sharply. “He did want me, that much I know. The Force doesn’t lie, and I felt it clearly. If you can think of another reason why he never again allowed me to get that close, I’m all ears.”

She avoided his gaze, turning her glass in her hand and looking how the dark liquid splashed against the thick glass. “I don’t know, Luke; I’m not him. All I’m saying is – don’t build a whole theory on the data that might be light years off.”

“They aren’t, Mara. I know Kyp – better than you do, in any case. Well, after I finally got it through my head that he wasn’t going to allow me a second chance, I got quite depressed. It felt really good to let go, and after that night I felt better than I had in a very long time, but I still thought he was my solution, as a person. Once I got over this idea, more or less, I left Yavin 4 – it was way too painful and distracting to be around him – and went to Coruscant. I started to think of what he had done and what he had said that night, instead of being obsessed with his body, and that was when the light started to dawn.

“I couldn’t disregard the facts, after all. I had sex with Kyp and it felt really good, and, after a lot of soul-searching and meditating, I became sure that I wasn’t in love with him; I just wished I was. So, it was possible for me to give and take pleasure, without this all-encompassing passion I imagined should be the cause for it. It took me a while to get accustomed to the idea, but this time there was nothing to distract me – we were at peace, I didn’t have any pressing concerns, and I was alone in Father’s old place. By the time Akanah found me I got far enough in my contemplations to decide that trying it again with someone else might probably be a good idea. Yes, I did sleep with her. More than once, too. Yes, she was a liar, she tried to use me, and she never really cared for me, but she helped to confirm my guesses, and she taught me a lot. Along with everything else, I realized that the technicalities of sex were just as important to master as in any other activity, and that I was wrong to assume that passion would give me any special insight in terms of what to do and how to proceed. Kyp at his twenty years had been much more skilled than I was at my more than thirty; he knew exactly what to do and how to do it...”

“Considering how long he must have been whoring himself, it’s no surprise,” his wife interrupted him.

“MARA!”

“I’m just saying it like it is. I don’t know what explanation he fed to you and Han, but I know enough of what was going on in Kessel prison to know one thing: there is no way he would have been able to survive without protection, Force or no Force. Come on, Skywalker, grown men were dying there by the dozens, if not hundreds, and you think that a child could have managed to survive on his own? He had someone to support him, and believe me, no one in a place like Kessel would have been altruistic enough to do that without demanding something in recompense. His body was the only thing he had to give. Two and two adds to four. You really are very naive, Luke.”

“No,” he breathed out in horror. “You must be mistaken, Mara. You must be.”

“I might,” she answered calmly. “But I’m willing to bet the Jade Shadow that I’m not. Did you ever ask him about his life on Kessel?”

“No. I never did.”

“How old was he when his parents died? Nine, I think?” Luke nodded. “Seven years, then, or something like that. You know, I’m really amazed. I’m starting to think that you’re right and I haven’t judged him correctly.”

“And which part of calling him a whore led you to this realization?” Luke asked acidly.

“The part where he cried when you made love to him.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some swearing. Some allusions to sex with minors. Nothing too graphic.

Lying motionless on a padded table with sensors and electrodes attached to his body was less unpleasant than he had expected it to be, Luke decided. There was something soothing and liberating in being nothing more than an object of attention for a time, even if this attention was as impersonal as it was diligent. But Cilghal’s webbed fingers, when she probed and poked at various spots around his body, were sure and skillful, and Luke reveled in the luxury of being at the receiving end without any necessity to reciprocate. In a way, it reminded him of that weird half-massage, half-sheichei Kyp had done for him many years ago, in the same way as a couple of notes, carried by wind, would remind one of a beloved song. His mind wandered, placidly, almost leisurely skirting over the bits and pieces of yesterday’s talk with Mara.

 _“Sorry, Mara, I’m not getting you here at all.”_

 _A sigh, then: “You haven’t had many interactions with people who had been, willingly or not, whoring themselves for years, have you?” Of course, it was a patently rhetorical question. “For them, sex is nothing more than a commodity. It has to be, or they’d go crazy. It’s kind of a self-protecting mechanism; they can’t afford to attach any feelings to it. Whatever your little fling meant to Kyp, it was anything but a commodity. No one is shedding tears after an orgasm unless there is a great deal of feeling involved. To retain these emotions at all, after what he had been through... I don’t even know what it takes. It all should have been beaten and fucked out of him years ago!”_

 _“Oh,” he said with a relieved sigh. “I thought you meant he cried because I reminded him of... being what you said.”_

 _She shook her head with a smile. “Luke, Luke... Didn’t you say just minutes ago that the Force doesn’t lie?”_

 _He bristled a little. “Well, what do you expect after shooting such a proton torpedo at me?”_

 _“For once, I said something good about him, and even then you found something in it to brood about!”_

 _“Maaaara!”_

He had been very relieved, though. Even the thought, that he might have reminded Kyp of being used like a piece of fuck-meat, made him nauseous. Mara’s words, actually, were hope-inspiring on more than one level; she had managed to not only reassure him, but also confirm his expectation that she would be able to finally let go of her prejudiced image of Kyp.

But, oh Force, if she was right, he didn’t want to imagine what might have happened to bend Kyp so out of shape now. The man seemed to define the word ‘resilience’!

Cilghal started to remove her devices, taking off one sensor at a time and massaging the reddened skin where they had been attached. He almost groaned aloud.

“There is no need to get up,” she told him, with a passable imitation of a human smile. “I can show you the results from here,” and she nodded at a portable multifunction scanner that hovered at her side.

Luke smiled sheepishly. “It _is_ a little too comfortable.”

“At least you haven’t fallen asleep. Kyp did.”

He perked up at that. “He did?”

“Yes. I let him sleep. For four hours. Then Tekli showed up, and he woke. He is used to sleeping in my presence, but hers is another story.” The former Senator sat on a high rotating chair beside the examination table and looked at Luke seriously with her big protruding eyes. “You were right, Master Skywalker, he’s in bad shape. Probably the worst I’ve ever seen him, up to and including the last check that was done on him right before his discharge from the Coruscant Medical Hospital. I’ll spare you the scientific details, but please look here.” She activated a table hologram. “The first column is your reaction times from when I tested you earlier on the reflex simulator. The second is Kyp’s.”

He scanned the data. The numbers in the second column were notably bigger.

“You see,” Cilghal said gravely. “It should have been more or less equal – you two always had similar reaction times, and Kyp is thirteen years younger than you are. If I had any authority over the matter, I would forbid him to fly for the time being.”

“Why not? You have this authority, as a medical specialist.”

She sighed. “I can’t. For him, he’s a wreck, but he’s still above the levels that are considered dangerous by the military. But what is not dangerous for an average pilot who knows his limitations, for Kyp...”

He voice trailed off, but Luke hadn’t needed the rest. Having someone who used to be a super-ace pilot flying with his reflexes blunted was a recipe for a quick death. And having him to lead a squadron was a recipe for more than one.

He rose up and sat on the table cross-legged. “So it’s up to me now.”

“You, or Admiral Kre’fey. Formally Kyp is under his command, not yours.”

He rubbed his face. It was true; the military authorities might even refuse to have Kyp grounded, based on his request alone. But Luke wasn’t eager to let the news about Kyp’s unfit condition spread; Kyp would hate that, and at this point, Luke wasn’t going to predict his reaction.

“Did you try to get him to talk?” he asked, although he knew what the answer would be. If Cilghal had any new insight she would have told him already.

“For all the good it did,” she sighed. “Seeing his reaction times shocked him, I’m sure about that, but the only explanation he gave me was that he’s tired and sleep-deprived, and everything would return to normal as soon as he gets some rest. I couldn’t confront him on that without revealing what you’d told me, and the source of your information, so I didn’t. I also asked him about his shielding, and the only thing he had to say was that being sleep-deprived makes him somewhat susceptible to influence, and he prefers not to take chances.”

“Susceptible? Kyp – susceptible?!” Luke couldn’t conceal his astonishment.

“That’s what he said. Master Skywalker... I have got the impression,” she stressed the last word, “that there had been an actual event that led him to this suspicion, rather than it being a simple paranoia. He looked genuinely angry when he said that.”

Luke pinched the bridge of his nose. “Uh-oh. The more I’m finding out, the less I like this situation.”

“That’s a whole different sack of krill, I agree, Master Skywalker. There aren’t many people who might be able to do that to Kyp, sleep-deprived or not.”

“Well, I’m certainly out of the list in this case. I never tried to intrude in his mind. Other than me... well, Jacen, Jaina, or even Anakin before his death might have had a potential to do that, but I doubt any of them had the needed skill.”

“I agree. And this leaves only one possibility, unless we both agree that Kyp decided to hide a past contact with an unknown strong Force user from us all. Which is, while not impossible, highly improbable, I’d say.”

“Corran,” Luke said quietly.

“Corran,” agreed the other Master.

Luke groaned. “I can’t believe he’d do something like that!”

“Corran Horn will do just about anything he’s able to rationalize,” Cilghal answered, with a distinctive chill in her voice. “Still, it’s nothing more than a possibility.”

“I don’t like it, even as a possibility,” he answered wearily.

Cilghal started to put her equipment back to order, covering scanner pads and coiling the cables. “Me too. I sincerely hope it’s no more than that, Master Skywalker.”

“Can you please do me a favor?” Luke said with annoyance. “Stop ‘Master Skywalker’-ing me. We’re not in public here. First Kyp forgets how to call me by my name, now you. Do I have any friends within the Order anymore, or only subordinates?”

The Calamari Jedi froze, still with one half-covered sensor pad in her hands. Then she exhaled and bowed her head slightly. “I’m still your friend, Luke,” she answered quietly. “So, I’m sure, is Kyp. But it has been unclear to us if you want to have friends, not subordinates.”

“Has it?” Luke asked, stunned.

“Honestly, yes. You haven’t been really listening to us for quite a long time. Especially to Kyp. You haven’t been telling us a lot, either. Practically all the interactions you’ve had with me were either related to business, or happened in formal circumstances, in meetings. Do you realize that our previous conversation was the first time in the last few years I’ve been able to talk to you without anyone else being present within hearing distance? I suspect that’s the case with Kyp as well.”

“But, Cilghal, you could have always just said you wanted to talk – I would have found the time!”

She turned away, and methodically covered the last couple of sensors, not looking at him. “It’s a touchy situation when your friend is at the same time your superior. More for Kyp than for me, I think; after all, he doesn’t have the benefit of being a former Ambassador and Senator. And it’s even more complicated when your friend and superior is, at the same time, your former lover.”

Luke gaped at her, unable to believe what she had just said. “He told you that?!”

“I didn’t need to be told,” Cilghal answered evenly. “I have a very keen sense of smell. If it’s any consolation, I’m sure no one else noticed anything, ever.”

“And you’re telling me that now because...”

“Because I think you’re right. Kyp is in great danger. I’m his friend, yes, but he might need more than simple friendship. I tried to help him, and I’ll try again, given half of a chance, but I’m afraid I don’t have a close enough connection with him to get through the walls he’s built around his wounded self. You do.”

Whatever Luke might have answered was drowned in the insistent beeping of his comlink. He cringed. It was rapidly becoming a theme during the last couple of days. “Skywalker,” he said wearily, after Cilghal passed him the device.

“Skywalker here, too, big surprise,” Mara’s voice answered with undisguised sarcasm. “You know, your slowness on the uptake must be contagious. I just remembered one thing from the day before yesterday, and now I want explanations. No, let me put it like this: you better get here and explain it before I remember why killing you seemed to be such an excellent idea a while ago.”

Luke sighed. “Probably if you just tell me what it’s all about...”

“No,” Mara answered curtly. “No homework, Skywalker. I’m waiting.” And she closed the connection.

“I have to go, Cilghal,” he said, getting down from the table.

“I see,” she said noncommittally, but Luke knew her too well not to notice the underlying bitterness of her tone, and a little ironic twist of the wide mouth.

He was already halfway to their apartment when a sudden thought stopped him cold. Just how many people he managed to insult by declaring Mara a Master after only a couple years of training, when it took about ten years for the best of his first students - Kyp, Cilghal, Streen, Kirana Ti - to earn the title? No one had said anything against it at the time, but had he really asked? Was that one of the reasons why his first graduates, his first Jedi family, had been keeping their distance, either maintaining their own business in hiding, or fighting independently, because they were questioning his judgment, for reasons totally unrelated to the whole aggression/nonaggression issue? Was it really a coincidence that out of his first class, not counting in Corran and Mara, since they weren’t really a part of it, only Kyp and Cilghal remained with him now? And for most of this war, he and Kyp had been locked in a bitter quarrel, and Cilghal had been much less visible than might have been expected from a former high-ranked politician, and a Jedi of her status.

He shook his head. Probably, if he asked Cilghal directly, he would get an answer. But did he really want to hear it?

The door to the apartment slid open even before he touched it, and Mara didn’t even wait for it to close fully to speak up. “When you demanded my word I wouldn’t use anything I was going to learn against Durron, you were thinking of his children, weren’t you?”

Luke nodded, and in a flash Mara was in his face, eyes blazing and lips stretched back in an angry snarl. “How dare you!?” she hissed at him. “You thought I’d hurt his _children_ to get to him? How dare you think that?”

Luke met her gaze squarely, refusing to be intimidated. “Don’t you think I had ample reason to believe that we probably didn’t know each other as well as I thought we did, after you questioned my commitment to you, after everything we had been through?! Fair is fair, Mara – if you don’t know me well enough not to question my love, I can’t be sure I know you well enough not to question your integrity!”

He watched, with a twinge of satisfaction he was unable to suppress, how Mara’s face ran through a gamut of expressions, from shock, to disbelief, then to astonishment, and, finally, to grudging acceptance. When it reached the last one, he decided it would probably be safe to speak again.

“Mara, your attitude toward Kyp has always been irrational. You have been guided by your emotions when it came to him, not by an honest assessment of his good and bad qualities. I couldn’t be sure your jealousy wouldn’t get completely out of control. I hoped it wouldn’t, but a hope wasn’t enough in this case. I didn’t think you’d do them any harm, no, but I suspected you might try to use them as leverage against him in some future conflict, and believe me, that would be a monumentally bad idea.”

She exhaled loudly, closed her eyes, and opened them again in a few seconds. They looked a lot better without the stone-hard fury in them. “I so want to beat you bloody!”

He afforded a smile; it always did wonders to Mara’s mood. “Because I’m right?”

“For a change,” she said sourly. “Yes. I don’t think I would have, but for a moment here... I thought of that. So he really does have them?”

Luke noticed that she entirely bypassed the whole issue about her doubting him. It didn’t surprise him; Mara rarely deigned to acknowledge her mistakes openly, especially big ones. She just tried her best to make up for them.

“Yes, he does. Two girls, identical twins, of all things, and a boy couple of months their junior. That’s just about all I know. He never gave me the names or any other information, only mentioned once that he’d thought of taking his son to Yavin 4, but decided the boy would be safer and happier on Dathomir for the time being. He visited them regularly, though, at least couple of times a year. Once or twice it took him so long to return I was afraid he’d decided to take the Sisters up on their offer, and stay there for life. Mara... do you understand his behavior better now?”

His wife rubbed her temples distractedly. “Oh, I do. I can’t spend a day without worrying for my son, and he’s in the safest place this galaxy has to offer right now. His are on an occupied planet, which has been occupied since the beginning of the invasion... how old are they? I can’t seem to do the math right now.”

“About thirteen, I think.”

“It’s almost adulthood on Dathomir. They are probably fighting along with their mothers and aunts. Oh, you bet I understand. He had to make the same decision I made on Borleias, didn’t he?”

“Yes, only he doesn’t even have the comfort of thinking they are safe. And he hasn’t had it for three years. Sometimes I want to slap myself for the way I tried to reason with him before Ben’s birth, before I understood... Telling a father of three children stranded on an occupied, fighting planet that fighting back is wrong was probably the dumbest thing I’ve done in my life, and that really says something, doesn’t it?”

Mara chuckled. “Oh, I can think of one or two more. But you’re right, that explains a lot. I hope they are still alive.”

Luke shrugged. “You know as well as I do, we haven’t had any contact with Dathomir for more than two years... oh, shit!” His wife stared at him, speechless. “Oh, flargin’, kriffin’ shit. Why hadn’t I thought of that before?!”

“Luke!” Mara’s astonishment gave way to irritation. “Can you please kindly explain whatever it is for me? Because I don’t believe I’ve ever heard you use that word!”

He gave her the explanation, starting with what he had found during their sparring session, and Octa’s revelations, and ending with Cilghal’s report. “I’m really worried about him, Mara. All of that doesn’t add up to anything even remotely good. If we assume that his children inherited even half of his power in the Force... we all felt Anakin die, after all. Even if they are not as strong as he was, Kyp would have been able to feel if there was... something wrong with them, even if no one else did.”

She chewed at her lower lip thoughtfully. “If they’re dead, you want to say. All of them, or one of them...”

“Dead, or badly wounded, yes. That might explain his depression, and his shielding.”

Mara thought about that for a long time, then shook her head. “No, Luke. It doesn’t add up.”

“How so?” he asked hopefully.

“Listen, we parents are not that different. I wouldn’t close myself for any reason if I thought something was wrong with Ben, especially if that was the only way I could get information on him. And if he was dead...” Mara made a gesture designed to stave off a possibility of her words becoming a reality, an old, galaxy-wide superstition. “What would have been the reason to shield myself then? I can give you a more fitting explanation. What if he became so tired of constant fear that he closed himself off to prevent himself from knowing? If they are okay, and he wants to be able to continue believing they are okay...”

“You’re contradicting yourself, Mara.”

She shook her head stubbornly. “No, I’m not. He might have even invented another reason for this shielding, just like he told Cilghal, because I can’t exactly see him admitting such a cowardly action openly, even to himself. It’s simple, Luke, really. Just think of it for a moment. Imagine yourself in his place.”

After a couple of minutes of contemplation Luke nodded. “All right. It doesn’t make complete sense, but it does fit better than what I thought of.” He looked at his wife and smiled. “You know, you’re starting to be really good at this compassion thing.”

Mara snorted. “Probably a residual hormonal fluke from my pregnancy.”

“Probably,” he answered, still smiling. “But that still doesn’t explain the ‘nothing out’ part of that shielding puzzle.”

“How about he doesn’t want them to feel his pain, or depression, or whatever sithin’ thing is happening with him?”

“Kind of like what Jacen did?”

“Yeah,” his wife drawled thoughtfully. “I just hope Durron hasn’t gone as far as letting them believe he’s dead. That can mess things up quite a lot, if they’re anything like their dear daddy.”

“Well, he hasn’t cut himself off from the Force completely, so I sure hope not.” He wrinkled his brow. “All right, while I’m as happy as any parent in the galaxy to disregard that possibility as a cause for his crappy state, I still can’t figure out what is wrong with him. And please, don’t tell me again he’s a big boy.”

Mara gave him a withering look. “I wasn’t going to say anything. Listen, did you say Octa refused to tell you something and recommended listening to gossipers?”

“Yes, she did.”

“Well,” Mara’s face lit up with an expression of determined anticipation. “People might be unwilling to gossip with you, but I have my sources. We’ll find out.”

Luke stared at her in surprise. Uh-oh. Mara was definitely On A Mission.

 

***

 

A couple of unremarkable days passed. Luke watched Kyp closely, but didn’t notice any new developments, except for the fact that Kyp seemed to be oblivious to his scrutiny. Which, of course, wasn’t normal, but after all the discoveries of the last week, it didn’t surprise Luke at all. Of course, the absence of bad news could be considered as good news, from a certain point of view.

Cilghal had taken their ruse more than seriously, though. In the last few days, she had completed health checks on every member of the Order on Mon Cal, and was going to continue doing that with the arrival of every new Jedi. “Call it reasonable paranoia, Master Skywalker,” she had said with the amused tilt of her hammer-like head she had learned so well from her human comrades. The reports, so far, were unremarkable. Everyone except for Kyp seemed to be in good shape, and some, like Jacen and Alema Rar, were even at their personal best. It was comforting; he would be able to concentrate his attention on Kyp, without worrying about anyone else.

A couple of well-placed discreet questions gave him at least one answer. No, he couldn’t get any squadron commander from the First Fleet, even a Jedi one, grounded without Admiral Kre’fey’s permission. Luke cringed upon hearing that; as much as he respected the Bothan, he had never had a good personal connection with him, which was one of the reasons why he was so glad to have Kyp in charge of all Jedi affairs at the First Fleet.

Those two seemed to have established an excellent working relationship from the first day of their acquaintance. So far it had survived everything that could threaten it, beginning with Kyp’s deception of the Admiral at Sernpidal (although Luke had a strong suspicion that Kre’fey understood Kyp’s game immediately and simply went along with it to be able to claim ignorance later), through the time when Kre’fey had been the main supporter of the outlawed Kyp’s Dozen, and finally to the point where Kyp had become the de-facto third person in command of the First Fleet, after the Admiral himself and Keyan Farlander. Even Kyp’s rejection of the Bothans’ policy of ak’rai seemed not to affect his standing with the Admiral; they just agreed to disagree. Therefore, Luke wasn’t exactly eager to intrude. He asked Octa to notify him in case they were given an order to leave Mon Calamari, though.

Mara had been relatively quiet and contemplative these days. Luke tried not to bother her; changing the opinions and perceptions that had stood her for years wasn’t easy, and he couldn’t do more for her than he had already done. He had tried his best to convey his support and readiness to help to her, though; all it earned him were a couple of warm smiles and a firm shake of her head. He had got the message: Don’t smother, Skywalker. So he didn’t, although the waiting was starting to get on his nerves.

They were sleeping together again; but despite all the previous innuendos, they hadn’t made love. The emotions between them were still too raw, the shared memories too fresh. A couple of times he caught her with a very peculiar, flushed look on her face and a distracted, heavy-lidded stare at nothing. He hadn’t dared to probe her; on the contrary, he withdrew himself completely, unwilling to take even a cursory peek.

 _“You thought you were the only one getting a bad case of hots for my body? Sorry to disappoint, then. Very few are immune.”_

Luke remembered that simple, devoid of pride remark from thirteen years ago all too clearly, and Kyp’s subsequent foray into the roots of the animosity some people felt toward him. Well, if that was the case with Mara, he hoped she would be finally able to see it for what it was and work it through. One way or another.

Luke flushed suddenly, the meaning of what he had just thought registering with him. Funny thing was, he couldn’t find even a bit of resentment at the idea. On the contrary, the visions it evoked were more than mildly exciting. He chuckled nervously, willing the warmth off his cheeks, which, he was sure, were rapidly approaching the color of the Krainan red soup. Those two were going to be the death of him – or, at least, of the relatively few inhibitions he still harbored.

“Master Skywalker? Is something wrong?”

Kriff. He completely forgot where and in whose company he was. “My apologies,” he said, to both Cal Omas and Triebakk. “I’m afraid I wasn’t paying attention.”

Omas’ gave him a scornful look. Triebakk laughed, with a huge uproarious Wookie laugh that reminded Luke so strongly of Chewbacca.

“That was obvious,” Omas said wryly. “Problems, Luke?”

He shook his head. “Nothing you should be concerned about. But, Cal,” he deliberately reverted to the use of the Chief of State’s first name, “I don’t see any point in me sitting here while you two are going through the whole list of ways to avoid the Senate’s ban on the centralized refugee help taxations. If you want me to pass any of them on to Kyp, to see if he can talk Irsenna into it, just give me the list.”

The Wookie senator growled something that sounded like a surprised question.

“Well, yes, actually that’s why I invited Master Skywalker to this meeting,” Cal answered, without waiting for a droid to translate it. Another question, and this time they both had to wait for translation.

“Senator Triebakk says he wasn’t aware there was a connection between Master Durron and Senator Irsenna and that he would like to know what it is.”

Luke shrugged. “Well, since they don’t hide it, I don’t think it’s classified information. Kyp had been engaged to his daughter and, although it didn’t work out, he obviously is still considered a friend of the family.”

“Obviously,” Cal said dryly. “A close enough friend to call him ‘son’. By the way, Luke – Irsenna’s daughter is now ruling his corporation, the second biggest one on Argovia. Now I’m starting to understand how your personal pain in the arse was able to maintain a private fighting squadron for years.”

Luke pressed his lips together tightly, not liking the way Cal was heading. “Whatever Kyp’s resources are, I’m sure they are legal. And I don’t see what relevance it has, anyway.”

“Everything is relevant, Luke. We don’t need any rumors about the business structures of Argovia influencing the High Council.”

He looked at Cal incredulously, then laughed. “Influencing Kyp? That’s rich. Cal, Kyp is essentially unbribable; just trust me on that. What’s money to someone who could have become the new Great Sith Lord, along with a good possibility of conquering the entire galaxy – and put it aside, voluntarily? And so far it seems to be the other way around; right now you’re trying to use his influence on Irsenna.”

The Chief of State’s lips quirked. “True. But Luke, it’s not a matter of what the reality is; it’s a matter of what the public might take it for.”

“I’m not removing Kyp from the Council,” Luke said firmly.

“I wasn’t talking about removing him,” backpedaled Cal. “But he – and you – better think of what to say if such a question arises.”

Luke raised his eyebrows. “The truth, perhaps? Financing a fighter squadron in the war is nothing to be ashamed of, on both sides. So is being engaged to someone.”

The Alderaanian sighed. “All right, let’s put that aside. The reason I wanted you to listen to our undoubtedly tiresome discussion is that you know your former student better than we do, and can judge which interventions he would consider attractive enough to argue for them. That’s first. Second, I don’t believe that a simple ‘here is the list, be a good boy and talk your might-have-been father-in-law into voting it through the Senate’ would be sufficient to get him moving. You have to be able to explain everything to him, and to answer his questions. If I thought I wouldn’t antagonize him, I’d have done it myself, but I’ve got the impression that I’m not his favorite person in the galaxy, for whatever reason.”

It was strange how everything lately was concentrating around Kyp. Luke sighed. “All right, let’s continue. I’ll try to pay attention.”

 

***

 

Mara’s amused hilarity was permeating the very air in their apartment when he got home. She was practically dancing – something Luke hadn’t seen her do since before the war. And as pleasant as it was to see her so joyful, the probable reason for that joy made Luke instantly wary.

Seeing it at once, his wife snickered. “Don’t worry, I didn’t kill anyone. But I think I found out what Octa was so reluctant to tell you, and, oh boy, it’s _hilarious_!”

Luke’s wariness changed to outright dread. Mara’s idea of hilarious was usually creepier than horror holodramas for bored teenagers.

“All right,” he said resignedly. “Shoot.”

“Well, it seems that your old flame is having problems getting laid lately.”

Luke silently picked up his fallen jaw and refused to comment. Mara continued: “There is a very colorful story going around about him and our very own Jedi slut, Alema Rar. Apparently, they were lovers at some point, or probably fuck-buddies would be a better term, since I doubt very much that love figured into this equation, on either side. Anyway, he showed up at her door a little while ago, shortly after Ebaq 9, and she kicked him out.”

Luke, being familiar with Alema’s sexual appetites, although not from personal experience, was unable to conceal his surprise. “What?!” he asked somewhat stupidly.

“What you heard, farmboy. She kicked him out, very loudly at that. According to witnesses, the gist of what she yelled in his face was that - and I quote - he might be the best lay in the galaxy, but she would be damned if she was going to spread her legs and serve as a substitute for a stupid cunt who was dumb enough not to recognize a good man when he was throwing himself at her, and if he dares to set foot on her doorstep again, he’s going to have her lightsaber shoved up in a place where it’ll do a heap of good to his sexual attitude.” Mara was unable to contain her giggles anymore. “Apparently, this little speech was even more colorful in Twi’leki, and just to prove that even Durron’s luck isn’t infallible, there happened to be someone around who understood it in full and wasn’t all that concerned about keeping his mouth shut.”

Luke cringed. “The tongue of this girl.”

“I agree,” Mara said, still smiling like a fiend. “It’s not nice to talk like that about your own squadron commander.”

“Kyp’s not her... oh! You think she meant _Jaina_?”

“I don’t think, Skywalker, I know. The stupid cunt in question is our dear niece, and apparently, Durron has been in love with her long enough for it to become a commonly known fact. That is, commonly known by everyone except the members of our family.”

“Is there any brandy left?” Luke said in a weak voice.

She poured him one, still chuckling. “I don’t know about you, but I find the idea of Kyp Durron being in love with a girl who’s almost fifteen years younger, completely oblivious to his charms, and capable of choosing a repressed Chiss flyboy over him, absolutely irresistible. And having another girl, who hardly ever bothers to close her door at night, deny him, just makes the whole situation priceless. I so wish that I was present at the event!”

“Mara...” Luke tried to be stern, but a smile stretched his lips almost against his own will. “Oh, skies black and blue! You’re right, it is funny.” He gulped his brandy. “In the short run, of course. In the long run... it’s not funny at all.”

“Well, it might make our family relationships just a bit complicated if Jaina ever decides to change her mind. I can just imagine it: ‘Uncle Luke, can you tell me how Kyp is in bed?’ With additional amusement value if Leia is present... or would you prefer Han?”

Luke groaned. “Mara!”

“Well, farmboy, you have to agree that it wouldn’t be your shining hour. In fact, I almost wish it’d happen, if not to see your mortification, then Durron’s. It’d be a nice, tidy revenge for the way he stole her from me.”

“He didn’t steal anyone, Mara. If you remember, we left Hapes quite voluntarily. I think you, and I, for that matter, should be grateful that he entered the picture and stopped her fall.”

“Seems like he had more reasons to do that than we thought.”

“Does it matter? He did it, and that’s more than can be said for us.”

Mara finally flopped onto the couch beside him and took away his glass. “Hey, give that to me. You’re not the only one who needs a drink.” She sipped the brandy, then continued. “You know, I almost hate to admit it, but I might agree with Alema. Kyp has his faults, but at least he’s human. This Fel boyo, on the other hand, is a creep. What the kriff she sees in him is beyond me.”

Luke stared at her. “I have to find out where Talon found this brandy and lay in a stock. Am I wrong, or are you telling me that you’d prefer to see Jaina with Kyp than with Jag?”

“Well, choosing between those two – yes, I would. I’d prefer even more for neither of them to be in the picture, of course.”

“That’s my Mara. I was starting to worry that someone replaced you with a Vong spy in an ooglith masquer. All right, let’s have a chuckle about that later. Now, though... other than that remarkable story, what else have you managed to find out?”

She shrugged. “Nothing. That gloriously failed attempt to rekindle the fire with Alema aside, he, apparently, has been a happy celibate at least since Borleias. Very romantic,” she added with syrupy sweetness.

It took Luke a couple of minutes to digest that idea. “Oh, Mara,” he sighed. “That’s not ‘nothing’. That’s not ‘nothing’ at all. Because if there is one thing Kyp for sure is not, it’s a happy celibate.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No warnings for this part.

Another day passed without a glitch, and then everything began to slide downhill with astonishing speed. When the buzzer went off at the door of their apartment at five hundred fifteen the local time, Luke was so sleepy that it took him almost a minute to understand what was going on and get up.

Mara, of course, was already out of bed and taking position in the shadowy corner of the living room with a clear line of sight on the door. Luke wasn’t at all surprised to see her holdout blaster already in her hands.

He reached out with the Force to determine the identity of their surprise visitor and his heart skipped a bit. “Relax, Mara,” he said softly. “It’s Octa.”

“I’ll relax when I’m sure she’s alone,” grumbled his wife. “Put on something and open the door, Skywalker.”

The buzzing became insistent enough to be really irritating. Luke slapped the door comm on his way to bedroom. “One minute, Octa, and please, let go of the button!”

The annoying noise stopped. Luke decided not to bother with pants, and put on his old, decrepit bathrobe, throwing another one to Mara on his way back. Then he opened the door.

The first thing he noticed were shiny, wet streaks on Octa’s face which looked awfully like tear traces, wiped off in a hurry. Seeing his attire, she gulped suddenly, as if only now realizing that she must have woken him up from a sound sleep. “I’m sorry, Master Skywalker,” she stammered. “I’m so sorry, but you said to tell you if something happened, and I though...”

Luke tugged at her arm, dragging the young Chandrilian into the room. “Sit down and take a couple of deep breaths. Tonic water or brandy?”

She sniffed. “Brandy. A cheap one.”

Mara snorted, tying her robe and shoving the little blaster in its pocket. “You think we have an assortment here? Now, drink this and try to explain coherently what happened.”

Octa practically inhaled the stiff drink, and the burn of it sliding down her esophagus, evidently, helped her concentration. “I shot Kyp down in sims today. Master Skywalker, it has never happened before! Never! I know that Jaina Solo did that a couple of times, and Fel, but me? I wasn’t even going to. I was aiming for his wingmate. I was sure he’d feel it and evade. He had plenty of time, but he reacted like he was moving his controls through a pool of goo! A child playing a hologame would have reacted quicker! Master Skywalker, I don’t know what’s going on, but there are rumors that we’re going to be sent as escort for the next supply run, and there is no way I’ll allow him to lead a squadron like that, even if I have to stun him. He’s not listening to me. He’s not listening to anyone, but if he loses another squadron he’ll never forgive himself, if he survives! And there is no way I’ll risk our guys like that, even for Kyp! And I don’t want to be tried for disobedience and riot...”

“Octa!”

“...and, sithspit, he’ll never forgive me again, and I’ve worked so hard...”

“Octa! Shut up!”

Startled by Mara’s bellow, the young woman gulped the air and became quiet. “That’s more like it. Luke, get a wet towel from the refresher. The colder the better.”

Luke obeyed, silently asking himself when exactly Mara had put herself in charge. Octa gratefully accepted the towel and buried her tear-stricken, reddened face into it, weeping quietly.

“When is this supposed supply run going to happen?” Mara asked, towering above the other woman with her hands on her hips.

“Dunno,” Octa mumbled without taking the towel away. “Couple of days, probably.”

Mara shook her head sadly and bit her lower lip. “Well, Luke, I’m afraid you’ll have to talk to Kre’fey after all.”

He sighed. “’Fraid so. It’s the same time on Ralroost as it is here, yes?”

Octa nodded, finally coming out of her towel refuge and looking at Luke as if he was a beacon of shining hope. “Yeah.”

“Well then, I think I’d better wait a couple of hours. I doubt the Admiral would appreciate his sleep being interrupted any more than I do. Go home, Octa. I promise, I’ll take care of this first thing in the morning.”

She sniffed again, but this time it was clearly just residue. “Thank you, Master Skywalker. But it can’t go on like this. I can’t understand what’s going on with Kyp – he’s always so rational! Now, it’s like he’s being driven by something, something awful, and he’s running from it, not thinking at all, just going by habits and instincts. As if when he slows down, it’ll eat him.”

Luke raised his head and stared at his onetime student. She just managed to put into words what he had been slowly realizing during the last couple of days. “I think you’re right, Octa,” he said thoughtfully. “Someone has to stop this running and find out what it is. But it won’t be you. Go home, sleep, and be ready to run the Dozen soon. I think Kyp is going on vacation, one way or another.”

Octa’s slightly slanted hazel eyes lit up. “Thank you, Master Skywalker. All I want is just to see him back to normal. I can’t... I just can’t lose another...”

“...love?” quietly supplied Mara.

The young woman nodded miserably.

“Go home, girl,” Mara said gently. “We’ll take care of it.”

Luke raised an eyebrow upon hearing the plural pronoun, but didn’t say anything. It was what he wanted after all, for Mara to warm up to Kyp.

“And, Octa!” Mara called the other woman when she was almost out of the door. “If someone has to stun Kyp, I get the privilege. I have been waiting for that opportunity for years, after all!”

Luke rolled his eyes. So much for warming up.

“And how exactly do you think we’re going to take care of it?” he asked, when the door closed behind Octa’s back.

“I’m all for locking him in a padded room, myself. But since using ysalamiri is off of the agenda, I have no idea how to _keep_ him in there.”

“Not to mention we don’t have any padded rooms available.”

“That can be arranged.”

“I don’t doubt your resourcefulness,” he said wryly. “But I’m afraid we have to think of something else.”

“Yeah,” his wife said distractedly. “He’s going to freak out when he learns he’s grounded, and the fewer people are around when it happens, the better. For all involved.”

Luke, who was slouching in an armchair with his chin propped on his chest, suddenly raised his head. “Freak out, you said? Huh. You know, that might be the key...”

Mara stared at him as if he was talking Huttese. “Would you mind terribly spelling it out for me?” she asked acidly.

He drummed his fingers on the armrest. “I don’t think the problem is that he’s going to freak out. It’s that he doesn’t allow himself to freak out. All right, listen to this and see if I’m wrong. Point one: Kyp has been under a lot of stress during all these years, but especially lately. He’s doing a triple amount of work... actually, I remember Jacen said something about him planning the whole assault on Ylesia, so I wonder if he did much more than just commanding a squadron and managing Jedi affairs, during the whole time he has worked with Kre’fey. He’s worried about his children. He has an unrequited love to intensify whatever misery he feels, and just to add insult to injury, a sexual frustration, which is not a feeling he’s accustomed to. Add to that the general stress of fighting a war, and you’ll get a burden that can crush even the strongest spine. Point two: what do people usually do in this situation? They freak out. They cry, they have hysterics, they lash out at their friends and families, whatever...”

“You don’t.”

“I’m not as temperamental as Kyp is, and, besides, it happened to me too. Kyp was even there during one of those times. But, Mara, if there is something Kyp absolutely dreads, it’s losing control of himself. He’s the definition of a control freak, no pun intended. So he’s bottling everything inside, and he’s driving himself to exhaustion just to get his mind off his misery. The problem is, once he really exhausts himself to the point when it’s going to impair his thought process, and I think he’s approaching this point rapidly, all bets are off. Octa is right, this run from himself should be stopped, no matter what it’s going to take.”

Mara interlaced the fingers of her hands and rested her chin on them with a thoughtful expression on her face. “As much as I hate this assessment, I think you’re right, o great Master. Want to hear what another control freak is thinking about this situation?”

“You have to ask?”

“By the way, do you realize how amusing it is, to hear you calling someone else a control freak? But, anyway... a hermetically sealed tank with boiling water in it is going to blow up. That’s a given. But if you put a valve in it, and let some of the steam out...”

“In other words, you’re saying he should be allowed to freak out, under control.”

“Yes. But it can’t be his control. If I was in his shoes, I would rather stash myself in a stasis tank than let myself loosen up even a bit without having someone around whom I considered strong enough to stop me when needed.” She gave her husband a sideways look. “I’m afraid in this case we have only one candidate for this job, and don’t think I don’t hate it. Han has stopped him once... but calling Han back will take time, which we don’t have. I guess you’re getting the short straw here, Luke.”

He nodded. “That’s what I thought. If I’ll be able to stop him, of course. I was unable to do that the last time I tried, if you remember.”

“Wasn’t it you who’d said he’d never fight you?”

He gave her a mockingly hurt look. “You’re so eager to dismiss the danger to my precious self that I might think you’d like me better as a blue ghost!”

To his surprise, Mara cringed. “Listen, I don’t like him. I maybe never will. I’m starting to think we’re too much alike for me to ever not to be irritated by him. But the risk is relatively small, considering the alternative. And despite that I often want to murder him, losing him senselessly is not an option. And if you think I don’t understand that, you’re greatly underestimating me, Skywalker.”

Luke held out his hands. “Just joking. As much as I wanted you to be rational about Kyp, it still comes as a surprise. All right, if we both agree on the general idea, let’s try to figure out the details.”

“You’ll have to take him to an isolated place. No inhabitants anywhere around.”

“Noted. What else?”

“Kriff, I don’t know. Pumping a double dose of sleeping drugs into him might work for a beginning. But he has to feel safe first. I don’t know, probably you should ask Cilghal if she has any secluded retreats on this planet you might be able to use.”

“That would be a start, certainly. All right, what time is it?”

“Almost seven hundred. Clothes, shower... and you might catch the Admiral already awake, but still in his quarters.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

“Get going, then.”

“I love you.”

“I know.”

 

***

 

In the end he didn’t have to ask anyone to find a solution. The solution found him, not entirely surprisingly.

Luke hadn’t expected the talks with both Traest Kre’fey and Cal Omas to be easy, predominantly because he couldn’t give them even half of the information he had, and was forced to rely on his own somewhat shaky authority with both of them. Fortunately, Kre’fey, after seeing the data comparison Cilghal’s checks provided him with, hadn’t required any further explanation. “Do what you decide as appropriate, Master Skywalker,” he had said calmly, although Luke could see the Admiral’s pristinely white fur standing up on the back of his neck. “Take the time, if you need it. I want Kyp back fit and sane. Losing him is not an option.” It was uncanny how such different beings as him, Cilghal, Octa, Kre’fey, and Mara, seemed to agree on this one thing.

Cal hadn’t been happy either, especially since Luke hadn’t given him much besides the cryptic ‘Jedi business’ explanation, but in the end there was nothing he could do to prevent them both from going. Cilghal always voted for Kyp in times of his absence, and could continue to do so, and Luke’s idea of appointing Mara as his personal one-time representative had been met if not with enthusiasm, then with acceptance.

Luke was leaving the Chief of State’s residence, heading toward Cilghal’s infirmary through the maze of corridors behind the Senate chambers, when he heard voices from around the corner, and the very first word made him freeze in place.

“Kyp, what do you think you have been doing here?” It was a female, and no one Luke was able to identify. But the voice that answered the question was immediately recognizable.

“My work, Taira,” Kyp answered, with a hint of irritation.

“Yeah?” it was a different voice, a male one, deep and smooth. “Seems to me that it’s your work that has been doing you.”

Luke recognized that cultured baritone. Irsenna. And the woman, then, was his wife. He leaned on the wall, cloaking his presence. Eavesdropping had never been his favorite pastime, but now, by Force, he was going to listen.

“I know my limits, Dohar.” The irritation in Kyp’s voice was obvious now. “Get off my case.”

“I’ll get off your case when you stop looking like a post-mortem hologram of yourself, you stubborn git! You think that falling seriously ill will help you to get your work done?”

Kyp laughed, but it was a brittle laugh. “Aside from that one memorable occasion when I broke half of the bones in my body, I’ve never been sick in my entire life, and I’m not going to start now.”

The woman intruded again. “Stop trying to bully him, Dohar. Kyp, we’re worrying about you. I don’t think you’ll even bother to deny that you’re tired and overworked. Any normal person would take a break in such circumstances; there is nothing in it to be ashamed about. We know that you’re not used to the idea, but, sonny, I hate to break it to you, you’re not getting younger, either. It’s Liberation Day in two days. Everything is going to be slowed down for a while. We have a beach house on one of the Hawaka Islands. White sand, crystal clear water, and some very entertaining places for deep diving. No need to bother with clothes, either – the island is small and there is no one else there. What do you say?”

The pause stretched, and Luke felt a surge of hope that Kyp, finally, might yield and agree, but then he heard a sigh. “I can’t, Taira. Thank you, though, some other time I’d love to go there. Just not now.”

“Kyp!”

“I can’t, all right?!” It was almost a yell. “Stop torturing me, please! I have to do what I can do, and if I can make this war shorter by even an hour, I have to try! Why can’t you understand that? Because your planet isn’t occupied?” Kyp’s voice had been climbing higher and higher in decibels, and so the oppressing silence after this last accusation was almost frightening. “I’m sorry,” he finally whispered. “That was unfair. I’m sorry. Just... don’t, all right?” And then desperate: “I have to go.”

Taira’s voice again: “Come to the dinner tonight. I want to be sure you’re eating, at least.”

“I will. Thank you both.”

Luke heard the sound of retreating steps and then an old Alderaanian expletive, uttered by a male voice. “I swear, if I find out that they are guilt-tripping him again, someone is going to answer for that. What are they, voluntarily oblivious? What the Sith is Skywalker thinking, anyway? His hands are trembling, for cliffsake! Someone should forbid him to fly, at the very least!”

Luke shook his head wryly. This talk was not going to be easy on him, but the opportunity was too good to pass. He rounded the corner on noiseless feet and said: “I already did.”

The pair started and turned to him. He bowed slightly. “Senator. Madame. I would have said I’m sorry for eavesdropping on your conversation, but I’m not.”

“Master Skywalker,” the man acknowledged him with official impassivity. His wife nodded, but didn’t say a word.

“I want you to know that you’re not the only people who are worrying about Kyp. I am, too, and so are some other Jedi who know what’s going on. We are not oblivious.”

“So what exactly is going on, Master Skywalker?” the Senator said impatiently.

“I’d rather talk about that somewhere in private.”

Irsenna nodded. “My quarters are just two levels up. Would you?”

“Certainly.”

They rode the slow elevator in silence. Luke was feeling a bit uncomfortable under Taira Irsenna’s curious scrutiny. In comparison to her big-framed husband, the woman seemed petite, but, in fact, she was only a couple centimeters shorter than the Jedi Master. Her long dark hair and brown eyes reminded Luke of his sister; he remembered Kyp’s old remark about her daughter also resembling Leia, and almost smiled. Jaina did, too. It seemed that Kyp had a thing for dark hair and brown eyes, at least in women.

The Senator’s apartment was a bit bigger than his own, with an additional room that served as a cabinet, but was otherwise unremarkable. “Well, Master Skywalker?” Irsenna asked, as soon as they all sat around a low mother-of-pearl table.

He told them a somewhat abbreviated version of his findings, not mentioning Kyp’s children, or the sordid state of his private life specifically, but hinting at it, and finished with another version of the summary he had recited for Mara earlier. After that they sat quietly for a couple of minutes, obviously digesting what he had told them, then the big man stood up. “Anyone wants something to drink?”

“Hot chocolate if you have it, milk if you don’t. Thanks, Senator.”

“I always told Dohar he judged you too harshly,” the woman said quietly, when the noise of the kitchen appliances became loud enough to cover anything said in the room. “He thinks you’ve been playing on Kyp’s sense of guilt. I happen to think that Kyp is perfectly capable of doing all his guilt trips without any outside help. As, I believe, are you.”

Luke looked up, and they smiled at each other in sudden and complete understanding.

“I really don’t want to fail him a second time,” Luke answered sincerely.

She laughed quietly and pointed a finger at him. “You see? And why do you think it’s up to you?”

Luke had an acute feeling of déjà vu, and for a moment he thought he even heard the soft ruffle of Vergere’s feathers and their pungent smell. He heard a low chuckle from behind. “A very good question, Prickle. Well, Master Skywalker? Why do you think it’s up to you?”

Luke searched for the answer. He supposed that the fact that he felt personally responsible for Kyp would mean nothing to these people, just like it meant nothing to Vergere that he felt personally responsible for Jacen. His feelings weren’t the issue; his qualification for the work was. He thought, warming his hand on a mug of thick, fragrant chocolate, then gave them the answer. “Because he can’t kill me. Because I can withstand everything he’s capable of throwing at me, consciously or not.”

“Kyp would never...” that was Dohar Irsenna.

The Jedi forestalled his objections by raising his hand. “I beg your pardon, Senator, but I believe I know better in this case. I’m afraid of the same thing. Pretty much all of us fear losing control, especially the ones who touched the Dark Side and are aware of the worst corners of their own nature. Our powers have a seamy side, and it’s not pretty. I got bitten by a crystal snake once on Yavin 4. Its bite is not lethal, but it induces immediate sleep, with some nasty nightmares for the unlucky beings that happen to be particularly sensitive to the poison. I proved to be one of those unfortunates. When I woke up some twenty hours later, my room was in shambles, and a kitchen knife that had been lying on a table was embedded in the door at head level, up to the middle of the blade. I guess I dreamed someone was trying to attack me.”

He saw a sudden light of understanding in the big man’s eyes. “Explanation accepted,” he said dryly. “What do you think, Taira?”

“Well,” the woman drawled, playing with her spoon. “I think it’s a pretty sound take, as clinically correct as it’s possible for someone who’s not a medic. Mental illnesses in all their variety are still, unfortunately, a mostly unexplored area. By the way, Master Skywalker, what exactly did you mean when you said ‘I already did’?”

“I called Admiral Kre’fey and arranged for Kyp to be grounded until I say he’s good to take off. He doesn’t know that yet. I hope he never will; it’s just a safety measure. If he asks for clearance, then the order will be switched to active status, and I hope it won’t come to that. I also talked with the Chief of State and notified him that both Kyp and I will be absent from the Council for some time. All I need now is a place to which I can take him.”

“So that’s why you came to us?”

Luke smiled. “It’s more of a fortunate coincidence, if you believe in such a thing. I was going to ask Master Cilghal if she could suggest something, but overheard your conversation on my way to her, and, well, a small, secluded island with no inhabitants and a comfortable dwelling sounds ideal. But if it doesn’t sit well with you, I can...”

He lapsed into silence, seeing the Senator standing up. The older man rummaged through a number of remotes, electronic keys, and other devices that were piled up in a big dark red handmade bowl on a top of a short column near the door, and came back with a small beacon device. “Here. We tested it just yesterday. The house isn’t locked, and if I can trust my aide, it’s re-stocked and cleaned. I don’t care if you trash it to the ground, just bring Kyp back to whatever passes for normal for him.”

“Thanks, Senator, Madame. I owe you for this.”

“No,” the woman said seriously. “We owe you – if you really can help him. Don’t waste any time.”

 

***

 

Luke tossed the small device onto Mara’s lap as soon as the door closed behind him. “Get dressed. I’m afraid we need to move quickly.”

“What’s that?”

“A solution to the problem of where to take Kyp. A small island with no inhabitants, but with a beach house.”

“Cilghal’s?”

“Irsenna’s.” He smiled in response to Mara’s raised eyebrows. “I’ll tell you later. Just please, never let Cal know, he’ll have a fit. We need a vehicle, preferably an amphibious one...”

“What we need,” his wife interrupted him, “is to think of how to get Kyp into this vehicle and keep him there long enough to reach this island! Something tells me that you haven’t thought about that!”

Luke stared at her. “I suck in planning, do I?”

“Please notice, you said that, not me! How about simply using Octa’s suggestion? I’m all for stunning him, it’ll save us a lot of time and headache, because, color me unimaginative, but I can’t think of anything to tell him that he wouldn’t be able to dismiss.”

“How about... hmmm... let’s say I have something to tell him, some important information, and I want to do it outside of the city to minimize the risk of someone overhearing us?”

“Might work. And my presence?”

Luke raised his eyebrow. “Guard duty?”

“I have to warn you, Skywalker, if he’s not buying it...”

“Then you can have your wish. Set your blaster to stun.”

“I live to obey, o great Master!”

“Oh, shut up, Mara!”


	5. Chapter 5

Mara had been right; Kyp wasn’t buying it. Not completely. And the farther they got from the Coral City, the more evident his tenseness became, until, finally, he snapped. “Do you think that the only safe place to talk on this planet is in the geographical centre of the ocean?”

“This ocean doesn’t have a geographical center, Kyp,” Luke answered, in what he hoped was an even and relaxed tone.

“Right, that’s why I’m asking. What the kriff is going on?”

“We’re kidnapping you,” Mara answered merrily from the driver’s seat.

The next moment, Luke became very grateful that their aqua-speeder was fitted with a canopy, for without it he was sure Kyp would have jumped into the water immediately. Luke was shocked by a wave of pure panic that momentarily passed over Kyp’s face, and even leaked through his impressive shields. In a blink of an eye, though, it was gone, and in its place came a stone-like, impassive expression that, nevertheless, was not bland enough to conceal a rapid rush of calculation. The eyes, darting in all directions, were a dead giveaway, too.

A memory suddenly surfaced in Luke’s mind – a get-together in one of their secret meeting places, before Myrkr, before Borleias. Kyp, storming out of the room, opening the door, finding his people eavesdropping behind it, and not moving a muscle to chastise them for their improper behavior. Kyp, who had always kept the discipline in his Dozen durasteel strong, despite his outwardly relaxed attitude...

Force, had it been that bad all this time? Had Kyp distrusted them so much, to have his people _listen behind the doors_ in case he needed a backup? A backup against _them_?

“Oh, skies black and blue, Kyp!” Luke exploded. “She’s joking!”

Kyp stared at him in disbelief, then nodded sagely. “Oh, I get it,” he said, snapping his fingers, a motion Luke followed with his eyes involuntarily. “That’s Jade’s specific brand of humor – making jokes about killing your _friends_. Remind me, please, what was it last time? _‘Locate a partially blocked artery in his brain, then just pinch it off. Bang, he's down and it's over’_ , I believe,” he said in such a perfect imitation of Mara’s voice that Luke felt a shiver trailing down his spine. He’d completely forgotten about that little incident, which he chalked up as an inane joke at the time. But if Kyp indeed had heard it, and, obviously, he did...

“Sorry to disappoint, Jade,” Kyp continued icily. “I don’t have any blocked arteries in my brain. And if you’re not turning this speeder back in three seconds, I’m blowing it up, right here and now.”

In horror, Luke realized that sometime during this conversation, Kyp had managed to lower his right hand, which now was wrapped around the hilt of his lightsaber. And the lightsaber, although still clipped to Kyp’s belt, was pointed straight down, right toward the energy generator located directly under the passenger seats. He almost groaned. So that what that finger snapping was all about. The oldest trick in Han Solo’s book, and he bought it, hook, line, and sinker! This business was getting from bad to worse at light speed.

Mara stopped the speeder so abruptly that the compensators whined. Then she just let her hands fall from the controls, ducked her head, and screamed in frustration. “Luke,” she said tightly after that. “Remind me again, why do I bother?”

“You’re doing just fine, Jade,” Kyp answered instead of Luke. “Now turn it around and head toward the city – slowly. By the way, you better not move, Skywalker. I have no idea what kind of bantha shit she fed to you, but I’m not feeling suicidal just yet. Don’t force my hand.” He smirked crookedly. “Pun definitely intended.”

Mara raised her hands and turned – slowly, as requested. “Listen, Durron,” she said through clenched teeth. “I don’t like you and I’m not making a secret out of that. I also admit that I happened to wish you an untimely death a couple of times through the years. But,” she said in an undertone, “right here and now, and for the foreseeable future, unless you’re going to do something drastically stupid, like try to kill my son, or other members of my family, I have no intention of killing you or doing any harm to you or yours. My word on that, on my son’s life.”

Kyp, still gripping his lightsaber so tightly that his knuckles turned white, stared at her with cold, hard eyes, then Luke felt him dropping a part of his shields slowly and painfully. He extended a probe toward Mara, and after a short pause, Luke, who did his best to keep himself as open as he could manage. “She’s telling the truth,” he said quietly, soothingly, as if trying to placate an angry, wounded animal. “We don’t intend any harm to you. Quite the opposite.”

Finally, Kyp’s tense body relaxed a bit and he sighed wearily, taking his hand from his lightsaber and flexing his fingers. “All right, so what it’s all about, then?”

“You’ve got everyone who cares about you worried sick, Kyp. You’re going on vacation, and if I have to, I’m making it an order.” He couldn’t resist adding bitterly: “For whatever it’s still worth to you. _We_ are going on vacation, actually.”

“What, all three of us?” Kyp asked mockingly. “I have to decline, then. I don’t have a voyeuristic bone in my body.”

Mara leered at him demonstratively. “Oh, but I do!”

An expression of utter confusion on Kyp’s face passed so instantaneously that Luke almost missed it. Kyp recovered quickly. “I don’t give public performances, Jade. Besides, do you really want to have material for comparison?”

“Stop that, both of you!”

Startled by Luke’s yell, both Kyp and Mara turned to him with the almost identical bewildered expressions on their faces, as if only now being reminded that he was indeed there. “Stop trying to provoke him, Mara,” he said wearily to his wife. “I understand, it’s hard to get out of the habit, but can you at least try?” Mara lowered her eyes for a moment and Luke considered it a sufficient response. “And, Kyp, she’s just pulling your leg. It’ll be you and me. Mara is going back to Coral City.”

“And I suppose my opinion on this subject means nothing to you?”

“No, but we’re going to proceed anyway. You expressed your unwillingness to take a break enough times during the last week, to anyone who cared to listen. I got the picture. Would it be easier for you if I issued an order?”

“No,” Kyp answered defiantly. “It’s frappin’ humiliating enough as it is.”

Luke sighed. “You haven’t left me with many options. Mara, drive.”

 

***

 

They arrived at the island within an hour, and Luke couldn’t contain a smile when he saw it. The whole chain of Hakawa Islands was formed by the peaks of underwater volcanoes, but time and unrelenting tide put a lot of sand and fertile ground around the stone peaks, which became a ring of lush green around the gray rocks. And the beach that surrounded both the trees and the stones, was indeed blindingly white, if a bit narrow. Kyp was going to feel right at home there.

The house didn’t disappoint, either. It was smaller and less luxurious than Luke expected, but completely in tune with the surroundings, being made partly from coral and partly from wood, tied together by colored dry seaweeds. There were no windows – the numerous gaps between the corals and intertwined wood branches provided plenty of light. The interior was divided into something vaguely approaching rooms by folding screens, draperies, and pieces of plain handmade furniture. Luke almost flinched, though, when he saw that there was only one decent-sized bed there; however, cots and sofas were aplenty and some of them looked very comfortable.

Luke turned to look at Kyp and found the other man staring at the big bed with an unreadable expression. “You can take it if you want,” Luke told him quietly. “I’m shorter, I can take a sofa. Now if you excuse me, I’ll send Mara back.”

“How long do you plan this hiatus to last, Skywalker?”

“As long as it’ll take for you to beat me in Jar’kai five rounds out of six. As usual.”

“You’re playing with fire, Luke,” Kyp said quietly. “Who are you trying to goad here: me, or her?”

He sighed. “Believe it or not, I only want to help you, and, as hard it is to imagine, Mara does too. That’s all. But if you want to find some hidden agenda, I can’t stop you from doing it.” He turned and went outside.

Mara was sitting on the footboard of the speeder. She had taken off her boots and the tide was swirling around her bare feet. “Lovely place,” she said when he came close. “Do you think Irsenna might be persuaded to lend it to us for a couple of days?”

He shrugged. “If I manage to put Kyp back together, I think it might be achievable.”

“How’s our patient so far?”

“Suspicious. Now he thinks I’ve arranged all this for my own sexual gratification. He’s just not sure who I’m keeping as target – him or you.”

Mara smirked. “Now do you see that I was right - we should have stunned him. Would have been so much easier.”

Luke refused to banter. “Mara... it might come to that. I can’t promise it won’t.”

Mara’s face became sour. “I know. He might need to... feel loved, I guess. I know, Luke. You might need it too. You never got a chance to work out this attraction you feel toward him. Probably if you screw him a couple more times, he’ll stop haunting your dreams and mine, too. Worth a try, I think.”

Luke stared at her, mouth open. “Mara... are you serious?”

“Like a lightsaber thrust through the guts. Don’t look at me like that. I owe him, all right? For you, for my happy marriage, for all the times you eased my aches and pains with those tricks he’d taught you, and for his expectations of getting a knife in the back, that he lived with for almost two years, because of my stupid remark. I don’t like to leave my debts unpaid. Probably after that we’ll be able to start on a more even footing, without his resentment over me ‘stealing’ your attention and my jealousy between us.”

She leaned forward and kissed Luke on the lips, a harsh, demanding kiss. “You’re mine, Luke Skywalker,” she whispered. “Nothing that might happen here will change that. Go to him and do the job properly. I don’t think any of us will get a second chance if we miss this one.”

“I love you, Mara,” he exhaled against her lips.

“I know.” She straightened up and climbed into the speeder. “I love you too.”

When the noise of the speeder began to fade, Luke turned around and took another look at his surroundings. The beauty of it was heart-stopping, and the peacefulness of it was so unlike everything he had been living with since the beginning of the war that it seemed surreal. Nothing here gave any hint that the galaxy that surrounded this place was drowning in the bloodiest war of all times. The sharp contrast between this serenity and the helter-skelter of Coral City gave Luke an idea.

He crossed the border between the bright sunlight and the light-streaked shadows of the house, closing the extremely flimsy looking door behind himself. Kyp’s lightsaber was lying on the bed, a sharp black mark against the light olive bedding, as straightforward marking of territory as a duffel bag put in the same place would have been. But the younger man himself was standing with his back to one of the carved columns that supported the ceiling with his hands folded at the small of his back and eyes closed. The pose so much resembled one of a prisoner tied to a post that Luke wondered if it was deliberate. “All right,” Luke said, suddenly very cognizant of the fact that he might have embarked on a vessel that was heading straight toward a sand storm. “Ground rules.”

Kyp opened his eyes, which were filled with undisguised sarcasm. “Oh, goody. Go on, please, I can’t wait to hear what the rules in this prison are. At least it beats all my previous ones on the comfort scale.”

Luke swallowed his objections. He had effectively detained Kyp and there was no way around it. And he was going to make it even more like imprisonment. “I want you to stop thinking about your duties outside this place. Forget about your Dozen – Octa is watching for them. Forget the Council – you know very well that Cilghal would never put down a vote that you wouldn’t approve of, even if it goes against her own. Forget Kre’fey – he’s going to find someone else to push his supplies through for a while. You’ve been so busy running from yourself that I bet you haven’t even stopped to think where exactly you’re heading. Well, the run is over, Kyp. You have to stop and think, and I don’t want any distractions. Give me your comlink. I’m going to put it away, as well as mine.”

An amused tilt of the black-haired head and the challenging stare was the first sign that this one wasn’t going to be accepted smoothly. “Just for philosophy’s sake, Skywalker, what if I won’t? Are you going to _attack_ me and _fight_ me for it?”

Luke sighed. “What would you need it for, Kyp?”

“Theoretically speaking, I just might call someone and ask for a pick-up. I didn’t sign on to participate in whatever fantasy you created in your deluded brain, you know.”

“Who would you call? Octa? Cilghal? Irsenna? None of them would come. You may call it a conspiracy.”

“Jai... oh, no, wait. I won’t call Jaina – she doesn’t deal well with conflict of loyalties. I’ll call Fior Rodan. He would come, I think, and eagerly.”

Luke decided that enough was enough. One thing he definitely didn’t want was for this story to become a lucrative subject for Holonet headlines. “Fine,” he said. “Keep it, if you want. I wanted to make it your choice, but if you rather not to make it...” He shrugged and picked up his bag, opening it and taking out the box that ever-resourceful Mara threw in it as an afterthought, just before they left the apartment. Luke was prudent enough not to ask her why she considered it appropriate to keep a powerful white-noise generator close at hand. “Get comfortable,” he said, turning it on. “I’ll be back soon – just need to find a spot for maximum coverage.”

Kyp rolled his eyes. “Oh, for the all the black holes in the Maw!” He unclipped his comlink from his belt and threw it at Luke with such force that Luke’s left hand, which he caught it with, became numb and then tingly from the blow. “But I also have something to tell you.” Kyp’s lips twisted in a grimace of disdain. “Taking it from me is not an answer. Keeping me under arrest is not an answer. Forcing me to do whatever you decided is needed to ‘save’ me is not an answer.”

Luke winced at this recital that so closely echoed some of what he had been saying to Kyp over the last years. Being a recipient of the list of don’ts without dos wasn’t pleasant. He had suspected that before, but now it was a reality, given to him in his own style. Kyp, meanwhile, smiled almost maliciously. “But I can give you one ground rule. Stay away from my bed. I don’t know what game you’re playing, but whatever it is, I don’t give a mynock’s crap.”

“I told you, I’m not playing anything.”

“And I didn’t believe you, and still don’t.”

“I just want to help you.”

“I neither need nor want your help. What I want is to find out why, after eight years of ignoring me, you suddenly became so interested in my well-being? What’s the matter, Skywalker, got bored in your happy marriage? Oh, wait! Probably it’s not you who got bored? Your dear wife does have a voyeuristic streak, by her own admission. So,” and Kyp made a show of looking around. “Where are the cameras?”

Luke ground his teeth, then closed his eyes and counted to ten. He could never match Kyp when it came to a war of words, and he knew that. Besides, it wasn’t his objective. He wanted to help Kyp, not antagonize him further, but somehow, in all his expectations of how their get-away might proceed, he never counted on such outright hostility. Naive, Mara would have said.

He completely forgot how difficult Kyp could be when he wanted to.

Finally, Luke opened his eyes and met Kyp’s coldly curious gaze. “Whatever you say, whatever you do,” he told the younger man, “I’m not going to fight with you, verbally or physically. Remember this.”

“How incredibly magnanimous. If you think it’s supposed to thrill me, you’re mistaken. Again.” Kyp suddenly pushed himself away from the column and strode out, leaving Luke standing there, staring at the small black speck of Kyp’s lightsaber on the smooth expanse of the enormous bed.

It all went downhill from there.

 

***

 

“...and I don’t know if I can continue that, Cilghal, I really don’t.”

Luke could hear the Mon Calamari’s sigh. “I take it Kyp didn’t react to your intervention well. It could have been predicted.”

“I know, I know. But I really thought it was a good idea at the time. Even now I’m not sure if it was a bad idea. But I don’t know how long I’ll be able to take it. He tries even my patience. If I only had some hope, some inkling that it’s going to work, it would be worth all the abuse. But so far...”

“Luke,” Cilghal interrupted him with a hint of impatience in her voice. “I can’t get a picture from your complaints. You have to tell me what exactly he’s doing and saying; probably then I’ll be able to give you some advice. My research work on stress-induced illnesses is not overly extensive, but I might be able to compare Kyp’s behavior to some trends I’ve noticed.”

Luke rubbed his forehead, hunching over the comlink that was lying on a low seaweed-woven table. “Well... I knew he can be sarcastic. But what he has been doing during these two days goes way beyond sarcasm. He’s displaying viciousness I never thought him capable of.”

He heard Cilghal’s amused snort. “No, truly. Somehow he’s managing to turn everything – and I mean everything – into an insult, a provocation, or guilt tripping. He started with accusing me that I arranged this trip to get him into bed again – and believe me, I don’t even want to go into the details of this accusation. He went through everything: the stance I’d taken during this war – ‘What’s the matter, Skywalker, are you that decisive only when you’re sure your opponent won’t fight you?’; my handling of the Order – ‘So you renounced your responsibility, huh? Force forbid you’d renounce your right to command as well. It would be such a gross irreverence to your family traditions’; my political maneuvers, or what he perceives as such – ‘Are you trying to win points with me with this so-called help, Skywalker? Afraid that your diminishing popularity both within and outside of the Order needs some heavy influx from mine?’ Mara has been getting quite a few honorary mentions as well – ‘Oh, of course, what can I know? I spent ten years earning the title of a Master, how can I compare to someone who was so brilliant as to earn it in less than three!’” He heard another amused snort from Cilghal. “Oh, I can imagine what you think about that. But it’s even more painful from being more than half-true. I know my mistakes, Cilghal.”

“Did you tell him that?”

“He doesn’t allow me to open my mouth a lot,” Luke answered wryly. “I tried to tell him I’m sorry a couple of times, to no avail. He thinks I’ve been ignoring him for eight years, and he’s constantly asking why the kriff I decided to change my mind now, but he never allows me to answer. He’s just answering it for me, with another outrageous explanation.

“And he’s making me understand the true meaning of the term ‘passive aggressive’. How is that for example: he hasn’t taken off his clothes yet. Not a single item. He even slept in them. Our fastidious, nudity-loving Kyp, yeah.”

“And why do you think he does that?”

Luke sighed: “That’s quite obvious. Guilt-tripping, all this ‘offended virtue’ and ‘poor kidnapped me’ routine. And I can’t say it’s not working. What I’m not able to understand is why, if he’s so unhappy with the situation, he hasn’t tried to escape? He could have found the comlinks, as well as the noise generator, if he wanted to. And we both know that... oh, crap!”

“What?”

“He’s coming back. I’ll call again as soon as I can.”

“Luke!”

“Yes?”

“He doesn’t want to escape. He’s testing you. Hold tight.”

He barely managed to hide the comlink before the door opened with a swish. Kyp strode in, barely resting his eyes on Luke, and proceeded to the bed, on which he fell noisily, turning onto his back and lacing his fingers under his neck. He was still in his brown flight suit, but something – probably the absence of the awful smell, together with some damp patches on the garment – alerted Luke to the fact that during his absence Kyp took a swim and washed his clothes. Of course, there was a dry cleaner in the kitchen in the back of the house, but so far Kyp had been adamant about not disrobing in Luke’s presence. The older Jedi smiled. So, Kyp’s distaste for the lack of personal hygiene finally won over his desire to play a victim.

“Don’t let me interrupt you,” the younger man said sweetly, turning his head to Luke and looking at him with the eyes that were reddened and just a bit overly bright. “You were calling someone – go on, proceed. After all, the fact that you restricted me from comm calls shouldn’t stop you from doing the same. That outdated concept of fairness ain’t all that grand anyway.”

Luke decided that he didn’t like how Kyp was looking. His face was even more pale and pinched than it had been two days ago, with a peculiar, slightly unfocused expression. What alarmed him even more were the pink, flushed areas on Kyp’s cheekbones and forehead. “Are you all right?” he blurted out even before he thought of what he was saying.

The younger man stared at him. “Now that’s a stupid question if I ever heard one. I’ve been abducted by two maniacs with the delusion of being charitable, cut off from my friends, forced to discard my work, stuck on an island barely three kilometers in diameter with no company except for one of the aforementioned delusional maniacs, whose motives I don’t know and don’t trust, no books, no music, no HoloNet... tell me again, why do you think I might possibly be all right?”

Luke ignored the diatribe completely. “Are you running a fever?”

Kyp snorted. “I don’t get sick. As you very well know.”

“You haven’t answered the question.”

“I’m not obliged to. Kriff off.” He rose up quickly, tottered a bit upon standing, and headed out. Only now Luke noticed that Kyp’s movements had also been slightly off-kilter.

“Where are you going?”

“I have all of seven-something square kilometers to go. You’ll figure it out.”

Luke called himself ten kinds of a fool later on, because it took him at least ten minutes after Kyp’s disappearance to activate his comlink and make a call. Kyp knew what he had been doing, when he mentioned the ‘outdated concept of fairness’. But Luke refused to let the instilled guilt get a hold; he needed Cilghal’s opinion, and he needed it now.

Cilghal answered the call immediately, as if she had been waiting for it. “Is he gone again? So soon?”

“Yes. I think I spooked him. I’m afraid he’s becoming ill – I mean, physically. He looks feverish.”

A brief pause, then: “I was expecting that. Well, as I said, hold tight.”

“Cilghal, can you, please, be a little less enigmatic? What did you mean when you said he’s testing me and why were you expecting him to become sick? Was there something in his health check you haven’t told me about?”

“No, there wasn’t, that’s why I’m not overly worried.” He heard a slight noise, as if the other Jedi was tapping her flipper fingers on the desk of her working station. “If you’d told me about this idea of yours before you and Mara implemented it, I would have given you at least a short run-down on what you might encounter in this case. But since you didn’t...”

“Cilghal...”

He heard a touch of humor creeping into her quiet, cultured voice. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to pick at your mistakes. I think Kyp is doing a wonderful job of it and doesn’t need my help at all.”

“Are you _cheering_ for him?”

“Can’t help it, sorry, Luke. I’ll recite the Jedi Code ten times in penance before going to sleep, but, admit it, he’s doing an excellent job on getting even with you.”

“Masterful,” Luke agreed sourly.

“That’s a good thing. He’s letting out his disappointment and anger toward you, not trying to repress it, like he has been doing for years. With his explosive temperament, repression is twice as dangerous for him as for any other being. And it’s better if he does it verbally, and in a controlled manner – hopefully, pretty soon he’ll let out enough to understand that it’s not helping anything, and then he’ll start thinking about how to solve a problem, not just make you hurt as much as you’ve made him.”

He groaned. “Cilghal, honestly, I never intended to hurt him!”

“I don’t doubt it, Luke. But it doesn’t change anything. You’ll have to talk it out – when he’s able to do that. You have to explain your reasons, without trying to make him submit to your point of view. Now, let’s return to your questions, because time is running out. Venting out his anger is only a part of what he’s doing, and this part is conscious behavior. The others are not necessarily so.”

Luke stared at the comlink as if the poor thing had the ability to be intimidated. “All right, be very specific from now on. Spell it out like I’m a blond.”

“You are blond, Luke.”

“Really? Things people refuse to tell me.”

They chuckled in unison, then Luke said wistfully. “I used to joke around like that with him. The sad thing is, I don’t even remember when I stopped.”

The Mon Calamari sighed. “Luke, concentrate, please.”

“Sorry. Go on.”

“I noticed some trends in the data I collected. There are certain patterns of reactions, of processing things, and they can be quite different for different groups. I won’t burden you with reciting all of them, but there are two that match both Kyp’s background and mentality and the way he’s proceeding so far. One of them is very characteristic of people who, either because of circumstances they were placed in, or because of the nature of their job, had to do things that are considered disgusting or morally impermissible by common opinion. Or experience such things being done to them. Or both. Former prisoners, slaves, Intel and counterintelligence field agents, special operations troops... you get the picture, don’t you? Their behavior model in the first stages of therapy is often very provocative and shocking. They’ll tell you a lot of outrageous things, in order to see your reaction. The reason for that is pretty simple, even if most of them are not aware of it – they need to be sure of the therapist’s non-judgmental attitude. They can’t risk that when they really open up, the person that is supposed to help them would run off screaming in disgust.”

“But...”

“Yes, I know, Kyp’s behavior doesn’t match exactly, but that’s because I don't think he is afraid of you being disgusted by what he’d seen or done. What Kyp always was afraid of, however, is your rejection. Does it make sense now?”

“He’s testing me to see if I’d say ‘enough of that, I don’t want anything to do with you anymore’? He’s demonstrating our differences in the most brutal way to see if I get offended or take a moral stance?”

“Very good. Yes, I think that’s what he is doing. He can’t risk coming apart at the seams on you and have you starting to withdraw from him again, or start explaining to him that his emotions are improper for a Jedi. And, Luke, if you’re likely to do that, you really better quit now. Even a hint of disapproval from you in a wrong moment – and you might cause irreparable damage.”

“I understand, Cilghal.”

“I hope so.” But the Jedi healer’s voice, in Luke’s opinion, lacked conviction. “Let’s move forward. Another trend, which often runs with the previous one, and this one is very characteristic of people who are used to be extremely self-reliant. This sort of person has huge trouble with asking for help or accepting it. They consider it something that is permissible only in times of extreme duress, and psychological problems are not viewed as a good enough reason by them. I think you might understand this outlook better than anyone else. How does it feel to be taken care of, Luke?”

He thought about that and found the picture extremely unappealing. “I see,” he said.

“Some of those people never get over it. Those are the ones that are constantly telling you they are all right, and then one morning you are finding them dead. Suicide seems more dignified to them than displaying a weakness. But survival instinct is a great thing, Luke. Sometimes – and quite often, thankfully – their psyche finds a loophole. A mental weakness is not a reason to accept help, but, for many of them, a physical condition or sickness is. And here the psychosomatic illnesses come into play. They just become sick, sometimes quite seriously, without any visible cause. That doesn’t mean that the illness isn’t real, though.”

“You think it’s what Kyp is doing?”

“So far he’s following the trend doggedly. We’re not that different from other beings.”

“I know that, Cilghal.”

“Intellectually, yes. But I’m afraid you still think that we should be held to different standards just because we’re Jedi.”

“Idealistic, yeah?” Luke smirked.

“Quite,” Cilghal answered seriously. “And you better disregard this notion now, because I foresee Kyp won’t be the only one. This relatively peaceful period might cost us more lives than the voxyns did, if we’re not careful.”

He rested his chin on linked fingers and looked at the comlink thoughtfully. “Do you have any predictions? I know you can sense such things. Who’s next, Cilghal?”

She sighed. “I can’t say for sure. I didn’t feel this coming with Kyp, after all. But I have a very good guess about who’s next. Tahiri.”

Luke bit his lip. “It makes sense. Is there any way we can prevent it?”

“Not that I can think of. And I don’t know if we should even try. It’s not anything foreign that is causing the illness, it’s their own minds and bodies. I’m acutely reluctant to intrude in something that might be an extreme, but natural way of dealing with the problem. My suggestion is to support the person through it, giving him or her what they need, talking with them... but nothing more radical, at least until we know more.”

“All right. But keep a fast speeder close by, just in case.”

“I’ll do that. And you keep an eye on him. Accidents happen, Luke – you better stay close.”

“I will. Thank you, my friend.”

“Thank you. It _was_ a good idea. It’s just not an easy one.”

He couldn’t contain a smile. “Figures.”

Luke turned the comlink off and frowned. Cilghal was right – he really should have taken more care with his preparations. Now the consequences of everything the healer had said were buzzing in his head, making Luke acutely aware of the fact that he had no time to think about them properly. He had to find Kyp. Accidents, he didn’t even want to think about accidents on this island, between the very deep waters and the very sharp rocks.

Cilghal had been right. Once again her sense of what can go wrong proved to be better than his. He found Kyp after less than ten minutes of fast jogging, and immediately after seeing him Luke understood that he had been almost too late. Because no one would be just enjoying water and sun lying in a crumpled heap on the surf’s edge, with the rivulets of crystal water swelling gently a mere centimeter under his nostrils.

Luke fell to his knees beside the nude body, turning the younger man on his back and feeling for a pulse. “Kyp! Can you hear me? What’s wrong?”

No answer, no even a flutter of the thick black eyelashes. But the pulse beating on the side of Kyp's long neck, above the familiar Dathomiri leather necklace, was full and strong under Luke’s fingers, if a bit fast, and he could hear his quick, shallow respiration and see Kyp’s chest rising almost imperceptibly. Kyp was alive, thank the Force. Just unconscious. One involuntary movement of the black-haired head, or the tide rising just a couple of centimeters higher, though, and Kyp Durron would have met a very dissatisfying and ignoble end, drowning in shallow water on one of the most peaceful planets in the galaxy.

Luke shook the younger man’s shoulders. “Kyp! Wake up! I’m not carrying you all the way to the house, you big lug! You’re at least ten kilograms heavier than I am!”

Once again, nothing.

“Great,” Luke said resignedly. “Just great.” Of course, he could carry Kyp if he had to, but somehow it didn’t sit well. Carrying Kyp like a sick child was just... wrong. Felt wrong, anyway. “All right,” Luke said after a couple of minutes of thinking. “I think I’m going to borrow something from your datapad. You can use another bath.” And the tepid water can ease the fever a bit.

“Irsenna got you right,” he said resignedly, nudging Kyp further into the water while supporting his head. “You are a stubborn git.” Moving backwards was slightly awkward, not to mention slow, but it allowed Luke time to think. He tried not to look at Kyp’s body under the thin layer of clear water, not to concentrate on the feel of the smooth, warm skin under his fingers; the last thing he needed now was to add lust to the confusing mix of emotions. He had to keep his head clear.

 _So what happens now?_

Call Cilghal. Call Mara. They would need supplies, probably, medical supplies... he might need another pair of hands to help him, too.

 _No. Just – no._

He couldn’t involve anyone more than he already had. From the very beginning he knew it had to be something only between the two of them. The world outside, their friends or lovers, even close ones, had nothing to do with it. There should be just Luke and Kyp; a little bubble of closeness in the midst of the all the hassle and tangle of affairs that were their lives. Allowing someone else into it might have made his task easier physically, but it would destroy any chance for repairing the fragile net of their relationship, torn in so many places.

 _You and I, my friend. Just you and I. We’ll manage._

They had to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \-----------------------------------
> 
> * The centre-center thing at the beginning, where Kyp is using 'centre' and Luke 'center' is wholly intentional, if probably a bit whimsical on my part. Kyp got something of a classical education (more on that further on) and Luke, of course, attended a school on a backwater peasant planet. I tried to accentuate that difference somewhat with occasional Briticisms.


	6. Chapter 6

Luke placed Kyp, still deeply unconscious, on the bed on top of the covers and shook his head sadly. Kyp’s temperature was so high that even a short trip from the sea’s edge to the house was enough for all the water on his body to evaporate. His skin felt hot and dry under Luke’s fingers, and the fine hair on his upper arms was white and fuzzy from crystallized salt. Luke shook his head again and went in search for something that could serve as a basin.

Rolling Kyp like a log onto the assortment of towels he had spread over half of the bed was not an easy task. Luke had forgotten how lax, heavy, and uncooperative a human body could be without an input from the brain. He ran a wet towel over the naked body, half-afraid to feel the familiar rush of lust that plagued him in the most inappropriate moments where Kyp was concerned, and half-resigned to the inevitability of it. To his own surprise, though, Luke realized that he felt nothing of the sort. Without Kyp’s personality to light it from within, without his unselfconscious charisma and fizzing energy, the perfectly proportioned body that was lying before Luke was just that – a body. A very aesthetically pleasing vessel for the soul that wasn’t there at the moment, but only a vessel nonetheless.

Luke smiled. Some things never changed. It was nice to know he still was attracted to personality more than looks, that whatever his feelings for Kyp were, they weren’t based on a mindless, instinctual, hormonal charge. He continued to wash away the salt from the unusually pale skin, cataloging the signs and symptoms detachedly, comparing the present picture with his memories.

Kyp hadn’t changed much. His body was still lean and strong, and the waist that many female students in the Academy had lost a whose-is-slimmer bet over, was still slender and trim. But the change, however minuscule, was as noticeable as the difference between a sunrise and a sunset.

It wasn’t the body of a youngster anymore. Age settled on it like a set of vonduun armor, making it look heavier and earthier. The charming instability of youth, the eager readiness for a change, was gone, replaced by honed to perfection, effective solidity. It wasn’t any less beautiful because of it, or any less desirable, but for some reason, Luke felt a sting of sadness that almost brought tears to his eyes. The ethereal, enchanting creature from that magic night thirteen years ago was gone, just as surely and irrevocably as gone was the wide-eyed boy from Tatooine who flew against the most powerful weapon in the galaxy as if it was an over-sized womp-rat.

What was left were two middle-aged men, tired and battered, and, for the first time since he had come to know Kyp, Luke thought of him not as a student, a child, or a protege. None of that fit anymore. They were equal; in experience as well as power, and, above all, in pain. Wasn’t that how most of the others viewed them? It was incredibly funny that all Luke required to finally believe in this fact was to see Kyp naked.

 _Still surprised by what a body can reveal if one is willing to see, are you?_

Luke ran the damp cloth close to the heavy, knotted Dathomiri clan necklace. There were now three small holo cubes dangling from it; last time he had seen it on Kyp’s neck, there was only one. Actually, he was surprised to see the necklace on Kyp; it wasn’t there during their spar session. The younger man rarely wore it openly, if ever; what had made him dig it out and wear it under his flight-suit on a supposedly unremarkable trip just outside of the city? Had he found some measure of comfort in wearing it? Luke hoped so.

Carefully, he unfastened it and took it off Kyp’s neck. The cubes were waterproof, but all those knobs and knotwork surely weren’t anything close to comfortable if one had to lie on them.

Suddenly Kyp’s chest rose in a heavy, shuddering sigh. It was so unexpected that Luke almost jumped off the bed in surprise. Then he slowly opened his eyes. They were clouded and unfocused, and with a jolt of panic Luke understood that despite the fact that Kyp was looking directly at him, he didn’t see Luke at all.

Kyp’s hand rose up swiftly and caught Luke’s wrist. “But, Jaya,” he slurred. “When you said that, you thought that death was waiting right around the corner. What’ll happen when the war is over and both of us are still alive?”

“Kyp...” Luke begun, at a complete loss, but Kyp’s fingers already became slack, and his eyes closed again with a flutter of eyelashes.

Luke continued his work, wondering what that cryptic question might have meant, and what the thing was that his niece had said to Kyp to get him so worked up.

The younger man’s condition was starting to change. The skin that was yellowish pale instead of his usual healthy tan began to flush and get hotter, despite the bed bath Luke had been giving him. The slack face started to contort in a grimace that could have been caused by pain, or cold, or both. Luke hastily covered Kyp with a light blanket, and the younger man immediately curled up into the fetal position under it. With dismay, Luke realized that his teeth were chattering. “Damn,” the older man said aloud. He remembered how awful it felt, from his bout of Creek Fever a while back. “Hold on, Kyp. There is one good thing about chills – they don’t last.”

Of course, when the chill phase was over, the sick person often wished they were back, but he refrained from telling Kyp that. Kyp was in no shape to appreciate the message anyway. Luke probed him lightly. The shields were still in place – a bit weaker, but impressive nonetheless. Getting through them with the hope to put Kyp into a healing trance would be a challenge, and while Luke was reasonably sure he could do it if there was no other choice to save Kyp, so far he saw no need for such drastic measures. Especially if Cilghal had been right, and Kyp’s illness was induced by his own subconscious. In this case the trance would do no good, and the idea of getting into a power-struggle with Kyp over access to his mind seemed even less appealing. They would have to weather it down in old-fashioned ways. Fortunately, Luke’s life on Tatooine, and in the military during the Rebel years, provided him with some experience.

Water, he needed plenty of water and some juice for nutrition and electrolytes. Making an unconscious man drink was dangerous, but necessary. Probably he would be able to coax Kyp back to a more lucid state for a time, who knows?

So Luke gathered the supplies and settled in for a long wait. And a long wait it had been so far; long enough for him to start noticing patterns and even developing a sort of a routine. There were relatively easy periods when the fever receded a little. During this time Luke was able to get Kyp drinking and eating small pieces of soft fruit, and give him a wash, while the younger man lay there in exhausted relaxation. Soothing Kyp’s aching muscles with a gentle massage was also something to be done, and Luke used every trick Kyp had taught him, and some that he had never gotten around to teaching Kyp, to relax the spasms and keep the blood inside Kyp’s body flowing freely. A couple of times during those periods Kyp had even opened his eyes and seemed to understand where he was and who was with him, but Luke wasn’t sure of that.

What followed this phase was more difficult. Usually the first sign of decline were bouts of chills, during which Kyp huddled under the covers, knotted into a tight ball of misery, with his teeth chattering and limbs twitching. It meant that Kyp’s temperature was starting to rise again, and his condition was worsening along with it. Then he was starting to talk with people who weren’t there and, in fact, were in some cases long dead. Luke was just as glad that some of those talks were conducted in languages he didn’t know well enough to understand; some of what he was able to understand should have been definitely marked TMI – way too close and personal.

He knew more about Kyp’s feelings for Jaina now than he ever wanted to, and all he was able to feel was an aching sorrow for the younger man. Jaina had got him, as surely as any woman had ever been able to get a man, and if there was a wrong girl in the entire universe for Kyp to fall in love with, it was certainly she. But then, Kyp had never done anything the easy way, and come to think of it, he supposed their connection as The Sword and The Shield should have manifested somehow, in something more than just battlefield camaraderie. Well, if it was their destiny, it would happen anyway, regardless of what everyone else thought.

That hadn’t bothered Luke as much as some other running themes in Kyp’s delirious chatter. Guilt, for example. Miko Reglia, and some other people who Luke assumed were the members of Kyp’s Dozen, featured prominently. Kyp’s sorrow over their deaths seemed to be as fresh and keen as if they had happened only yesterday, and Luke cursed himself for ever believing Kyp was taking those casualties lightly at the time. Loneliness, too. This one was, actually, bordering on obsession; blaming people who died on him for leaving him wasn’t a healthy outlook, to be sure, but Luke couldn’t deny certain logic behind Kyp’s crazy accusations. Staying alive had its down side; he had learned that as early as his first year as a Rebel, but then, most of his friends had managed to survive; Kyp, judging by his frantic recitation, hadn’t been as lucky.

 _And every one of us who could have helped him to deal with losses had been too engrossed with his own problems_ , Luke thought bitterly. Not that it was a long list – he and Han were pretty much the only people Kyp could afford to lean on, and Han had had enough problems dealing first with Chewie’s death, and then with the loss of his sons, to spare any energy or attention for Kyp. Despite that, he probably managed to give Kyp more than Luke, who had got so caught up in the struggle of power and opinions with the younger man that he managed to render himself oblivious to his friend’s desperate unhappiness, which, evidently, wasn’t a recent development. No wonder Kyp had been so suspicious, so distrustful of Luke’s motives.

Luke shook his head. It wasn’t a good time to brood over his past mistakes. He was there to make up for them, if it wasn’t too late for that, and he couldn’t afford to be distracted. The talkative phase was almost over; Kyp’s speech was becoming rushed and slurred beyond any recognition. It was a sign that the next fit of wild thrashing was already in coming. The fever was spiking again, and the unbearable ache and discomfort it brought was sending Kyp into a sequence of desperate stretches, rolls, and senseless kicks that, of course, never helped, but it almost got him falling on the floor more than a couple of times. And a concussion was the last thing they needed to deal with.

He hadn’t dared to restrain Kyp. So far Kyp had never become aggressive, either physically, or using the Force, and Luke was immensely grateful for that. He wasn’t going to attempt anything that could sent the quintessential warrior Kyp was into a fighting mode. So the only non-restrictive thing he could think of had been to block Kyp from the edge with the pillows and his own body. It worked, but all this mad hopping across the wide bed was exhausting, not to mention the nice collection of bruises he started to acquire from Kyp’s accidental swings. It usually lasted about an hour and a half, and by the end of it Luke was welcoming the restful phase like a long-awaited respite.

He had no idea how many days had passed; more than one, in any case. Time ceased to matter. His world now ran to the one-two-three-four count of ebbs and floods in the fever that ate at Kyp’s mind and body. At least, at last, Kyp’s mental shields were starting to weaken. He, apparently, was running out of inner resources; the illness was refusing to allow him to divert his energy to anything else.

Luke didn’t know if it was supposed to be a good or bad sign.

 

***

 

“Luke...”

He came out of the light trance immediately, opening his gritty eyes with difficulty. What was that?

“I don’t understand why you are doing that, Luke...”

His heart jumped up to his throat and continued beating there. Was it possible that Kyp was coming to consciousness? He was only getting worse lately, with the restful periods continuously receding in length.

Luke leaned forward, taking a careful look at Kyp’s flushed, rugged face, and his heart sank back, first into his rib cage, and then further down, seemingly all the way to his stomach. Kyp wasn’t talking to _him_. He hadn’t even acknowledged Luke right before him. The eyes with abnormally dilated pupils stared straight forward, not distracted by Luke’s movements, and held an unchanging expression that had nothing to do with here and now. The Luke who Kyp was talking to existed only in his delirious imagination. Nevertheless, it was worth a try.

“Doing what, Kyp? What do you mean?” he asked gently, augmenting his words with the Force, trying to connect to Kyp’s distorted perception.

“That... nothing. How can you not understand? It’s so simple. They are our people, Luke, our children... sisters, brothers, friends. And they are being killed. If the Force is in all living beings, then the ones who’re killing them by the billions are diminishing the Force. What are you waiting for? Want to be left without people around _and_ the Force? I don’t understand it.”

Oh kriff. Why couldn’t he have asked something that would be easier to answer? What could he answer? Getting into a philosophical debate with a delirious man seemed not exactly prudent. He had to calm Kyp; agitating him now might bring on the thrashing phase prematurely, and Luke was still sore from the previous one.

“You were right, Kyp,” he told him earnestly. It was a truth, after all. “I was wrong. I’m sorry. I thought of other things that were important, but...”

“Why are you doing that to me?” Kyp interrupted him, as if not hearing his words at all. “I’m not your enemy. They are.”

“I know, Kyp.”

“Why are you putting me in this place? I don’t want to be against you. It’s painful, don’t you see? I’m not some freaking Sith Lord... not anymore. Why do you cast me as one?”

“Kyp...”

“We’re defenders, aren’t we? So why do you cast me as an aggressor for doing something I’m supposed to do? Why, Luke? Is it your way of getting even with me? I hurt you, now you hurt me... but I never wanted to hurt you. I swear. I just didn’t want you to make a big mistake.”

“Me too, Kyp,” Luke whispered, feeling his dry, tired eyes starting to mist. “I didn’t want to hurt you, either. Same thing. We made a mess out of it, didn’t we?”

“I thought I could count on you, no matter what. But I can’t. It’s this redheaded bitch you married. Always hated me... probably for the best... people are dying around me... should have known...” Kyp’s speech was becoming slurred, almost unrecognizable. “Dead are the only ones who stay with me... my personal entourage of ghosts...”

The little lost bantha cub expression on Kyp’s face was heartbreaking. An orphan child, all alone in the world of his imagination, again.

“I’m here, Kyp,” Luke said through the constricted throat. “And I’m going to stay here. You’re not alone.”

But Kyp didn’t hear him. Instead, his eyes turned to stare above Luke’s shoulder, with a focused expression Luke hadn’t seen in them since he brought Kyp back into the house. Startled, Luke glanced over his shoulder, but the shadowed corner Kyp was looking at was empty.

“And you,” Kyp said accusingly. “You’re a vapin’ nuisance, brother. I can never be sure you’re here. Are you just teasing me? Never showing up, always leaving me wondering if you’re really here or I’m just imagining it. I can’t go on like that! I have to know! Show up, or kriff off.” His voice rose, loud and clear as it hadn’t been for days. “Do you hear me?”

The silence would have been deafening if not for the distant swish of the surf. Luke, suddenly very uneasy, knee-walked to Kyp, who tried to sit upright, raising himself on his weak, shaky hands. He slid behind the younger man, propping the hot, dry body against his chest. Did Kyp really feel his dead brother there? Luke closed his eyes and reached out. Yes, there was something... something like a ripple in the continuity of the Force, like a wave of hot air that hung over a desert during the day, swaying and distorting the perspective.

“Zeth,” Luke said, feeling his hands becoming cold from unexplainable dread. “Show up, if you can. He needs you, don’t you see?”

A ripple became more pronounced, and a faint whiff of something that could have been frustration leaked to Luke through the Force. Kyp, obviously, felt it too, for he suddenly leaned forward. “Oh, no,” he groaned. “Not this time, brother!”

Luke, aghast, didn’t have time for anything but whispering ‘no!’ before two things happened at once. Kyp’s shields crumbled, disintegrating so quickly that Luke felt, almost physically, the wave of freed energy that was previously devoted to maintaining them filling Kyp’s body, threatening to flood and overcome it, like a torrent of water suddenly released from behind a dam. It was too much to dissipate safely, Luke realized with horror. It should be released somehow, somewhere... but how?

Kyp didn’t give him time to think about it. The blue lightning bolts shot from his outstretched hand, right in the direction where Luke felt the ripple. But to Luke’s astonishment, the walls that should have been blown away aflame by it stayed unchanged. The lightning just got absorbed by something, vanished into the thin air, or rather something that seemed to be no more than air...

The ripple became stronger, more frantic. “Yes,” whispered Kyp. “Yes, brother. I’ll get you.” Another barrage of lightning. Despite his own horrible memories, Luke could feel that the blue bolts carried no malevolence, no hostility. It was just energy, pure and simple, and finally, he understood what Kyp was attempting to do. He was feeding the energy to the ghost, in a feeble hope to make it strong enough to manifest itself visibly. And so far, it seemed to work. Luke could almost see the air in the shadowy corner solidifying, acquiring volume and substance, although it still held no recognizable shape, and the blue tinge he was used to associating with Force ghosts was still absent. But Kyp couldn’t keep this up for long. He was precariously weak already, and in a very real danger of draining himself to the point of no return if he kept pouring his life substance into his brother’s ghost.

“Kyp, stop!” Luke shouted at him. “You’re killing yourself!”

But Kyp wasn’t listening; Luke could feel his furious, single-minded determination. Nothing would have stopped him now, and Luke did the only thing he could think of. He raised his hand and a second stream of blue fire joined the one that was flowing from Kyp’s fingers. The airy figure in the corner solidified further, rapidly assuming a distinctly human form. Blue sparks flew at the edges of it, gradually melting into a continuous, familiar glowing blue contour.

“Kyp!” an almost inaudible voice rustled through the air. “Stop that! At once!”

The command in that incorporeal voice was so compelling that Kyp obeyed almost immediately, sagging in Luke’s one-handed embrace. “You...” the voice spoke again, weaker this time. “Continue!”

Luke didn’t have to be told twice. It was working, Force, it was working, and the consequences of such a discovery were so dazzling that he would have continued this attempt to the end, even if he hadn’t had a personal stake in it. He watched in amazement at how the figure continued to form itself under the lightning bolts, absorbing and distributing them, acquiring shape and color within the blue borders. It took less than half of a minute, and the tall figure of a young man in black, nondescript clothes, with short dark hair and a stormtrooper’s bearing, stepped forward, leaving the shadowy corner for the golden-streaked air of the room.

Luke looked at him, enthralled. The likeness was so prominent that he was sure he would have identified this man as Kyp’s brother, anywhere, anytime. The same high cheekbones, same chiseled features and incongruously full, pouting lips. But what really surprised Luke was his facial expression. For the first time in his life Luke Skywalker saw a truly pissed off Force ghost.

“And what in the name of the Emperor’s armpits did you think you were doing, little brother?” Zeth inquired angrily.

Luke felt Kyp stirring under his hands and wished he could see his face. “...to be sure... were here. No hallucination.”

“No hallucination,” assured Zeth, towering above both Jedi with his hands on his lean hips. “I’m always here. You should have trusted your feelings more, Kyp. Isn’t that what Jedi are supposed to do?”

He heard a sound that could have been a snort. “S’psed to, yeah. Doesn’t work all that well. I... trusted my feelings before. And killed you... as a result.”

Zeth cocked his head, looking at his brother intently. “You’re still stuck on that? I thought you got over my death years ago! What’s this, a relapse?”

Luke almost choked. Kyp, apparently, wasn’t far from that either, since he straightened up and asked indignantly. “Are you vapin’ crazy? It’s not... something you can get over!”

The ghost smiled at him. “But you have to. For me, if not for yourself.”

“I can’t,” whispered Kyp. “S’tired... of surviving. S’fraid of being alone. Brother, if you love me... take me, please.”

Luke’s sharp intake of breath mixed with the outraged ‘What?’ from Zeth. Then the spirit leaned forward, propping one of his feet at the edge of the bed. “Now I really wish I had a body,” he hissed in Kyp’s face, “so I could slap you silly. You’re not alone, nor will you be. I’m here, and I’m going to be here until the day you die, and if you so much as think of bringing that day any closer than it’s supposed to happen, I swear, I’ll kick you back! You’re living for two now, Kyp. Don’t you dare to let me down! I have to live your life if I can’t live mine. If you’re so inclined to feel guilty, remember that!”

“’F not for me...”

“If not for you, I might have been alive, yes. But not free. And besides... not that I wouldn’t wish to be alive personally, but this galaxy was definitely better off with me dead.” Zeth smirked mirthlessly. “Never thought of that, little brother? You think I would have wanted revenge any less than you did if you’d managed to rescue me? Two of us on a rampage with the Sun Crusher – I bet we would have made a bigger impression than you alone did! You might have listened to Han Solo, but please remember, for me, at the time, he was nobody by the name of nothing. Would you have shot him down if I told you to do it?” He searched his brother face and sighed. “I thought so. You were about to, anyway. Do you understand now?”

Luke didn’t know if Kyp did, but he could definitely see Zeth’s point. If Zeth had Force abilities... and he had, since he was able to appear as a Force ghost... two Sith brothers unleashed on the galaxy in tandem – that didn’t bear thinking about.

“Your friend here definitely does,” Zeth smirked, then frowned at Kyp. “Oh, no, not just yet. Hold on, brother, focus just a little bit more. You called me forth. You wanted to talk. Now make an effort and stay conscious, kriff it!” He looked at Luke over his brother’s head. “Can you help him?”

Luke nodded, taking a hold on Kyp’s head, and placing his fingers on the younger man’s temples. The shields were gone now, leaving Kyp with only the most basic mental defenses in place. A simple imperative to concentrate on Zeth’s face and words, augmented with as much energy as Luke dared to transfer to Kyp without burning his skin, proved to be sufficient. Kyp stirred and shook his head. “You wouldn’t have...”

Zeth laughed bitterly. “I was a stormtrooper instructor, Kyp, with a lot of experience on the field. A consummate killer. The fact that I love you dearly wouldn’t have stopped me from killing anyone else in a heartbeat. Let’s not talk about that anymore. Listen. There are a lot of people who love you. You want to make them mourn you like you’re mourning me and your friends? There are even more people who rely on you. And you’re going to let them all down just because you’re afraid? Isn’t that selfish?”

“Probably I want to be selfish for a change!” Kyp answered challengingly.

“Then find another brand of selfishness! Death wishes are just too vapin’ permanent. Screw someone without bothering to reciprocate. Tell this prick Horn everything you think he should know about himself. Stop being noble and self-sacrificing and kiss this Solo flygirl already. Kick that stupid cleaning droid to pieces. But death is not an option for you, because I’ll be waiting on the other side, and if I think you hurried up, believe me, you’ll wish you were alive! I acquired a lot of experience in making people miserable as a boot camp instructor. Do you hear me, soldier?”

Luke heard a weak chuckle. “Yessir!”

Zeth smiled, and this smile, so like Kyp’s, made Luke’s heart ache. These two deserved so much better than the cards life had dealt them. “That’s my Kyp. I have to go now. Just remember – I’m here, with you. Always.”

“I love you, Zeth. Don’t ever leave me.”

“I won’t. I love you too, you know. Besides,” he smiled again, very mischievously. “You’re madly entertaining most of the time.”

“Don’t go...”

But Zeth’s ghost was already starting to dissipate. “Not up to me, sorry,” he said, shaking his head. The last thing Luke was able to see of him was a grateful nod in his direction.

Kyp’s body sagged in his hands and Luke realized with a jolt that it was covered with a thin layer of sweat that became more and more plentiful with every moment. _The fever broke_ , Luke realized dimly. _Finally. Thank you, Zeth_. Only now he allowed himself to feel his own exhaustion and the burning ache in his palm. He looked. It wasn’t charred, thankfully, just reddened. That wasn’t too bad. He had to put them both into a healing trance, right after he found out where those blasted blankets vanished to.

Come to think about it, the idea of having a former boot camp instructor serving as a bouncer at the doors to the afterlife definitely had value. Pity he could hardly talk Zeth into expanding his audience.


	7. Chapter 7

A slight movement, more forceful than usual rise and fall of a chest covered with a damp, sweat-soaked blanket under his hand, and Luke, who had slept with part of his awareness still active, woke up. He didn’t show it, though, listening to his bedmate’s breathing for half a minute before doing anything. Yes, Kyp’s breathing pattern was changing. Luke almost sighed. He wanted to hope for the better, but it might just mean another round of verbal abuse. However, there were things he had to do before even attempting to talk to Kyp.

He slid from the bed, trying his best not to shake it, and went to the annex that served as a kitchen. Even if Kyp was going to continue sleeping, he had to wake him up. Dehydration was not something you could joke with.

When Luke returned with a huge mug of water, liberally augmented with juice, and a straw, he wasn’t surprised to see Kyp turning his head and looking at him through barely open eyes. Luke didn’t bother with asking him how he was feeling; he was familiar with the effects of prolonged fever and dehydration. “Drink this,” he ordered, kneeling on the floor and putting the straw to Kyp’s mouth.

Kyp didn’t have to be told twice. However, after only a half of the mug, his eyes had started to close again. “No,” Luke said sharply. “Drink it all. Come on, Kyp, we don’t have intravenous lines here; don’t make me force liquids into you, literally!”

Kyp’s eyes lit with outrage for a bare second, but then he, apparently, understood the necessity. It took a fair amount of urging, though, and a couple of not too gentle nudges to make him finish the whole mug, and as soon as the last swallow went down, he was asleep again.

Luke definitely wasn’t going to complain. It made his next task much easier. The bed was a mess. The formerly pristine and expensive sheets and bed covers were crumpled, dirty, and soaked with sweat, not to mention torn in quite a number of places. Fortunately, the clean linens were just under the bed.

By the time he managed to change everything, he was exhausted again. Even the small task of lifting Kyp’s body with the Force felt too taxing; he wondered just how much energy he had poured into Zeth’s ghost to get him that sapped. How long would it take for Kyp to recover from the combined effect of the severe illness and energy drainage? Luke sighed. They definitely were in for a long and unpleasant ride.

The last thing he did before falling on the bed again was settling another mug of water on a bedside table. They were going to need it.

 _Two hours. Then I’ll have to wake him up again. I just hope he still will be too weak to talk._

 

***

 

“Wake up.”

Nothing.

“Wake up.”

A barely perceptible flutter of eyelashes was the only reaction Luke got.

“Filswik! Wake up, Kyp!” This time he went as far as lightly slapping Kyp’s face.

“Mmmmm.” One bleary eye opened – barely – and immediately closed again.

That was something, but Luke was too tired to continue at this rate. He looked at Kyp in wordless frustration. What could he do to get him awake and semi-coherent? The idea of slapping him for real didn’t seem right, despite having a certain appeal. Luke was at a loss as he looked at the younger man. Then he grinned. He had had to endure Kyp’s crazy accusations for days; well, the least he could do in retribution was give him some grounds for them.

With this thought Luke leaned forward impulsively and kissed the precise spot where Kyp’s long, strong neck met with his stubbornly outlined jaw, which he knew from past experience was particularly sensitive, with open mouth. Then he bit it.

To his astonishment, instead of waking up in indignation, Kyp just groaned quietly and turned his head, allowing him better access. Luke stared at him mutely. After all those protestations... he just couldn’t believe this! Even still suffering from the illness Kyp should have felt who was with him. He was a Jedi Master, and that included awareness on a level that ruled out any misunderstandings, and he wasn’t delirious anymore; just asleep, if deeply.

“You son of a scabby Hutt,” Luke said slowly. “You raked me through your interrogation device of a tongue, and all that time you’ve _wanted_ it?!”

He smiled, a bit smugly. It was pleasant to know that this crazy attraction was still far from being one-sided. Apparently he wasn’t the only one having difficulty with letting the old memories go.

The most immediate problem, though, stayed unsolved. Luke suspected that right now he really could have fucked Kyp with the best of his abilities, and the younger man would have slept soundly through it. Wouldn’t that be a waste! However, as much as he regretted having to wake Kyp up, the instructions he remembered from the basic medical training he had gotten in the Rebel military forces were strict and explicit. For this level of dehydration at least twelve full glasses of water a day were required, in discreet doses, and it was an absolute minimum.

There was a way around, though. Kyp’s mental shields were still quite basic. Luke loathed invading Kyp’s mind for anything that wasn’t a matter of life and death, but the possibility of permanent damage to his heart and kidneys wasn’t something to be sneered at, either.

“All right,” Luke sighed. “Last chance.” He rubbed Kyp’s sternum with the knuckles of his fingers, very hard. This move was usually used on deeply unconscious or comatose people, but Kyp wasn’t very far from that.

To his surprise, it worked. Kyp’s eyes opened, and before they got a chance to close again, Luke lifted him into a sitting position, supporting him first with the Force and then with a hand around his shoulders. “Drink,” he said, making it a clear and compelling order. “The whole glass, Kyp. Concentrate.”

His patient drank the liquid dutifully, and as soon as he was finished, Luke let him fall back. To his surprise, Kyp’s eyes didn’t close immediately. Then his lips moved, but all that came from them was a barely audible whisper.

Luke leaned closer. “What?”

“Hope... enj’in’ your v’cation.”

Luke stared at him. “A lot, thank you for asking.” If, by Elassar’s felicitous remark, Mara could be spooky even singing a lullaby, then Kyp definitely could manage to be sarcastic even while making a declaration of undying love. He was still more dead than alive, and his mental shields were all but gone, but the verbal ones were already firmly in place.

“To borrow a phrase,” he whispered, brushing Kyp’s cheekbone with his fingertips, “I’m not your enemy, Kyp. Don’t try to protect yourself from me like I’m one. It hurts, don’t you see?”

For a moment, he thought Kyp might answer, but the imperative for sleep proved to be too strong.

 

***

 

Ten glasses of water later he woke up because of sudden movement at his side. Kyp was trying to sit up.

Luke rubbed his gritty, swollen eyes. “How are you feeling?”

“Still too weak to kick you out of my bed, pity that,” Kyp was doing his best to offend Luke’s sensibilities, but his tone was definitely lacking in abrasiveness.

“Ah, but at least you can talk about that.” Seeing Kyp continue to struggle for the upright position, he asked, surprised: “What’s the rush? I can bring you anything you need.”

“Unless you have a bedpan here,” Kyp answered through clenched teeth, “no, you can’t. And if you do have it, I’d rather not.”

Luke flushed in embarrassment. During those awful days he had completely forgotten about that. Kyp’s overheated body had been consuming everything he managed to put in it without giving anything back. To see this basic need returning was a relief, but at the same time he could imagine how Kyp felt about being unable to take a leak by himself. That was going to be difficult.

“How about a compromise? I’ll help you to the refresher and leave you there. I’d rather not have you falling down on your way and breaking your neck. I believe Zeth would haunt me for the rest of my life in that case, and probably even after!”

Kyp dropped down on the pillows and looked at Luke with eyes that suddenly made the older man feel transported seventeen years into the past, so full they were of anguish and desperate hope. “So he really was here?”

“Yes, he was. Quite a brother you have, Kyp.”

His friend sighed. “I better be careful, then.”

“That would be prudent,” Luke observed with a smile. “Unless you really like the idea of him staying pissed off at you for eternity.”

Kyp smiled wanly. “Force forbid. By the way... thank you. For helping to bring him here,” he clarified, seeing Luke’s quizzical look.

“Nothing to thank me for... but if you’re really determined to be grateful, can you opt for not fighting me tooth and nail at every step for at least a couple of days? There is no need for it, really.” He looked at Kyp seriously and, deliberately echoing Kyp’s words from many years before, added: “I’ll still respect you in the morning, don’t worry.”

He could see from the expression on the haggard, pale face, that Kyp placed the reference, but wasn’t happy about the reversal in their positions at all. “Funny of you to suddenly start to remember all that,” he said slowly, looking Luke straight in the eyes.

“I’ve never forgotten, Kyp. I’m sorry I gave you reason to believe I did.” He caught the expression of surprise in the darkened eyes. “Yes, I know it’s my mistake. As are a lot of others. Can we talk about that later? I don’t want you to think afterwards that you were too easy on me because you were exhausted.”

Kyp’s smile was still weak, but this time it reached his eyes and lit them from within. “So, are you going to fight with me now?”

Luke smirked. “Only about important things.”

“Oh, well. Compared to not fighting at all, it’s progress. All right, I think I’ll need to sit first, before even trying to stand up. Stand by the side of the bed and give me a boost.”

 _Now what did I say right?_ Luke couldn’t believe his ears. _His_ Kyp was back, as easy as that, and the tremendous relief he felt at that thought couldn’t stop him from worry. Had Kyp found something in his words that wasn’t there, and what would happen when this misunderstanding came to the light?

No matter. First things first. He grabbed Kyp’s hand and pulled him up, with another hand supporting his shoulders. “Easy,” he said. “Just put your legs down and sit like that for a minute. Lean on me if you feel dizzy.”

To his surprise, Kyp did exactly that, propping his forehead on Luke’s body. Luke slipped his fingers into the matted, knotted mass of black, silver-streaked curls on the head that rested on his stomach, and fought back tears. A gesture like that told him more about Kyp’s ability to forgive and trust than any dramatic statement could.

“Dizzy?” he asked in a thick voice. Kyp nodded. “Wait a minute. Relax.”

He started to massage Kyp’s head, trying to increase the blood flow to the brain, gradually going down to neck and shoulders. He doubted it would help much with dizziness, but it kept both of them occupied while waiting, and, more importantly, felt good. He fully intended to make Kyp feel as good as possible; they both needed that, him probably even more than Kyp.

“Better?”

“Somewhat. I think you can let go now. Go start a bath... I stink, don’t I?”

“We both do. All right, but only if you promise you won’t try to stand up while I’m not here.”

That earned him a glare. “I said I’m going to be careful, what else do you need?”

Luke rolled his eyes. “I’m familiar with your definition of ‘careful’, and it’s not reassuring. All right, sit tight.”

For all the simplicity of the house’s design, the bathroom, or, rather, bath-porch, was furnished with the best the galaxy had to offer in this area. The huge sunken bathtub was more reminiscent of a small pool than of a washing facility, and the shower stall, being very plain at first glance, was fitted with nearly a hundred different options and features, as he had discovered. Luke had given up trying to find out how to use even half of them on the very first day.

He had never tried to use the bathtub, though, and he was very curious and a bit apprehensive. If it was anything like the shower, he might spend an hour figuring out the controls, and now wasn’t the right time for that.

The control panel was easy to find, being located on a flexible rod by the side of the bath, like an exotic mechanical flower. It was, Luke discovered, controlled by voice as well as manually, and after getting through a familiar standard procedure of voice recognition, Luke opted for the former.

All right, temperature option was easy to manage, but Luke completely forgot what pH means, if he had ever known it in the first place. He rolled his eyes and set it for ‘default’. The ‘flow’ option was also puzzling. Luke set it for ‘bottom flow’ and ‘slow current’ out of pure intuition and shrugged. After all, he could always change it later.

The water started to hiss and bubble, coming out of the multitude of tiny jets at the bottom of the tub, and Luke understood what the ‘bottom flow’ meant. Judging by the current rate, the tub was going to be full in less than five minutes. It was time to fetch his patient.

Kyp, true to his word, was still sitting on the edge of the bed in a slumped pose, although he straightened quickly upon hearing Luke’s footsteps.

“Sometimes I wonder about people that design those appliances,” Luke told him with a chuckle. “I imagine they have some grandiose delusions and think they are planning a space station.”

The other man smirked. “Taira’s always had a thing for outrageously modern and expensive appliances when it came to living arrangements. A backlash from her years of poverty, I think. I don’t believe she uses even a third of their options, but she claims she likes to have them. Options, I mean.”

“How did you know it’s their house?”

Kyp shrugged. “Hard not to – the linens smell exactly the same as they did on Argovia. You can’t imitate something like that. How did you manage to talk them into giving it to you? You’re not their favorite person in the galaxy, at least not Dohar’s.”

“No, but you are. All right, let’s try to get you up and walking. No heroics, all right? If I as much as think that you’re trying to overdo it, you’ll be levitating all the way to the 'fresher.”

Kyp’s face cringed. He hated to be levitated.

It took them a good five minutes to cross the twenty-meter distance to the refresher between the living room and the porch, and by the end of it Kyp was frustrated almost to tears. “I hate this,” he whispered when Luke got him seated on the toilet seat.

“I know. But it’ll pass quickly, trust me on that. All you have to do is drink and eat, and you’ll be back on your feet in no time.”

“I just...” Kyp lapsed into silence, as if suddenly aware he had been going to say something too revealing.

“You just what?” pressed Luke.

“Nothing... bad memories, that’s all.”

“The medical center?”

Kyp gave him a brief, sideways glance. “Not only. Just leave me alone, all right? Go comm Cilghal... she must be pretty worried. I’ll call you when I’m done.”

Luke just nodded. Kyp needed to be alone, to get himself back under control or just to cry his frustration out without a witness. “I’ll do that.” And he closed the door behind himself firmly.

But ten minutes after Luke’s talk with Cilghal was over Kyp still hadn’t called yet, and Luke, torn between worry and unwillingness to intrude, finally decided that enough was enough and extended a tentative Force probe. Kyp was alive, and still conscious, but what he was doing made Luke find himself at the door to the ‘fresher in a flash. “Are you crazy?” he demanded through the closed door. “You’re as weak as a newborn pitten, and you want to rebuild your shielding? You don’t have enough energy for that!”

“Frip off,” was the irritated answer. “I have to. If you’re worried about my energy, find me something to eat.”

“Stubborn monkey-lizard.”

“Mother hen. I know what I’m doing. I’m a Master, in case you’ve forgotten that fact.”

It was, indeed, a good reminder. He had to trust Kyp’s judgment; a lack of trust was one of the main reasons they had got themselves into this mess to begin with.

Kyp called him right when he was settling two bowls with porridge with a lot of cream and fruit, some sweet biscuits, and a teapot of mild naris-bud tea beside the bathtub. The younger man was sitting on the floor of the ‘fresher with his back to the wall. “Did you fall?” Luke asked, alarmed.

“No. I’m not that weak. It’s just more comfortable.”

 _And less dizzy down there_. Luke snorted. “Only you.”

“Only me what?”

“Only you can Force-meditate while sitting in a 'fresher.”

“Oh, come on! If you can read in it, why the kriff can’t you meditate? Besides, I wasn’t.” He gave Luke a mildly challenging look. “Are you going to help me, or you’d rather continue to lecture me on the abysmal disrespectfulness of connecting to the Force while taking a leak?”

Luke bent to Kyp and took a hold on his waist, while the other man’s hands linked behind his neck. “On three. One, two, three.” And he lifted Kyp from the floor in one smooth move. “You’re giving a new meaning to the words ‘piss off’, do you know?”

Kyp just chuckled. “Whatever works.”

“Right. Still our practical Kyp.” Standing like that, still linked, still intimately close, with Kyp’s nude body pressed to his, presented a strong temptation, and this time Luke didn’t ever bother to fight it. He leaned closer and kissed Kyp’s curved lips lightly, chastely. “I’m glad.”

He heard and felt Kyp’s sharp intake of breath, and a slight tenseness in his body. “Are you?”

“Yes. ‘When two men in business always agree, one of them is unnecessary.’ I’m learning to cherish the differences, my friend.”

Kyp cocked his head. “Nicely said.”

“It’s not mine. I read it somewhere a couple of months ago, and it stuck with me. For some reason as soon as I saw it I immediately thought of you.”

Kyp smirked. “A mystery, indeed. Lead on, Skywalker, this time I don’t have any other choice but to follow. I want this bath.”

The bubbling hot water that rose from the bottom in gentle streams and overflowed the stone-clad sides of the bathtub, was a sheer, shameless indulgence. Kyp required some help with washing, but otherwise managed mostly by himself. They ate – Kyp practically inhaled his portion of porridge and cast quite a few longing looks upon Luke’s, but they both decided he shouldn’t eat too much at the first intake, to avoid the possibility of indigestion. They drank the sweet, stimulating tea, and nibbled at the biscuits in quiet. After days of almost not eating at all in Kyp’s case, and getting a hasty bite now and then in Luke’s, they savored every swallow.

“What’s up with your obsession with shielding?” Luke asked languidly. “It’s not like I’m going to intrude in your mind, after all. What’s the haste?”

Kyp made a face. “Remember Streen’s main problem?”

“Yes. He was hearing other people’s thoughts in his head... a multitude of voices that were driving him mad.”

“Same thing here, only with other people’s emotions. I got over-sensitized somehow... still trying to figure out how and why. I had been having problems with that since the beginning of the war, but lately it became a real bother. All this grief and anxiety around... not something you want to experience if you value your sanity. It’s better here, quieter, but I still have to shield, at least minimally.” Kyp yawned. “Sorry. I s’ppose we have to get out.”

“Don’t see why. You can sleep here, if you like. We have to do something about your hair anyway – unless you want just to shave and be done with it. It’s matted like a wild nerf’s fur. Why do you always let it grow out that long?”

“It was a custom on Deyer. Still trying to be a citizen of a dead planet. Foolish, I know.”

“No. We need attachments, even symbolic ones. The more the better.”

“Oh. And since when have you realized that simple fact?”

“I think I always knew. I just forgot for a time. Intellectualizing and detachment are very seductive in many senses... probably as much as the Dark Side is.”

“It _is_ the Dark Side, Skywalker. There is just more than one path to Dark Side, that’s all. If you like quotations, how about that: ‘Hate is not the opposite of love – indifference is.’”

“That’s an interesting one. Who said that?”

Kyp smirked. “Me. But I believe I’m not the first one – I actually saw a couple with much the same meaning around. It’s nice not to have a proper education – I feel free to coin any phrase I want.” He yawned again, this time so widely that Luke wondered how he managed not to dislocate his jaw. “You’re right, I’d better sleep here. Bed is definitely too far. Another galaxy, practically. If you want to amuse yourself with my hair, there should be a tube of something called ‘Three Herbs Balsam’ around – Taira would never willingly part with it. Putting about a third of a tube on this mess usually helps a lot. I promise not to wake up.” With that he tuned to the control panel and commanded, without bothering with voice recognition: “Bath, the lounge on side B, full spread.”

Luke watched in amazement how a portion of the wall beside Kyp started to protrude and elongate, forming a simple, but comfortable inflatable silvery cot with head- and armrests. “What?” Kyp asked, noticing Luke’s surprised stare. “Who do you think was programming most of those monsters they bought?”

Luke laughed. “Don’t get too comfortable. Two or three hours – then you have another meal and a pot of tea to go through.”

“You’re a sadist, Skywalker. Who would’ve suspected that?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> * When two men in business always agree, one of them is unnecessary. - the quote belongs to William Wrigley Jr., US chewing gum industrialist (1861 - 1932). I have no idea who was his equivalent in SW universe, but I like it too much to resist the temptation to insert it. :)
> 
> * The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. - Elie Wiesel, Nobel Prize laureate and Holocaust survivor.


	8. Chapter 8

_Sleek mass of hair, anointed with viscous, sharp and fresh smelling fluid, under his hands; a virtual feast for a hair slut. He was running his fingers through it, untangling the vicious snarls and knots, separating the straightened tresses one by one, watching them come alive and curl back into loose ringlets as soon as he took his fingers off them. Then the liquid started to absorb and evaporate, lending a healthy shine to the black locks, previously dulled by sickness and prolonged neglect. He couldn’t tear himself away; he was sitting there long after the last snarl had been untangled, running his hands over the dark mane, and coiling the locks around his fingers. Guilty pleasure, this fixation, and he knew it. But was it really bad to indulge once every thirteen years?_

Luke groaned quietly, suspended on the brink between the sleep’s haze and sun-streaked, sea-smelling, fresh-aired reality, not discerning a memory from a dream and not caring a sliv. Whatever it was, he loathed to let it go.

Something moved behind him – a warm, familiar body pressed to his back. That sensation ceased to be strange days ago; Luke’s subconscious adjusted to having a male bed partner instead of female one amazingly quickly. Somewhat to his surprise Kyp hadn’t even tried to insist on sleeping alone anymore, probably realizing the futility of trying to convince Luke he didn’t want it with most of his shields down and his emotions out in the open. 

However, his behavior was still strange. That offer to do his hair a couple of days ago had been a come-hither if Luke ever saw one; Kyp couldn’t possibly not know what such a proposition might do to Luke’s equilibrium. But like a cat, who at the same time wants to play with a chestnut, but, afraid of its prickles, paws it slightly and jumps back, he vacillated. He was allowing Luke almost total physical closeness – which was somewhat of a necessity, since he still was weak and in need of constant attention – but intermitted it with unvoiced, but plainly noticeable, attempts to put more distance between them. And right now Luke could feel something else that was new; not unpleasant, but, quite possibly, heralding another round of problems.

There was an erection pressed tightly to the cleft of his buttocks, and, despite the fact that Kyp was still, obviously enough, soundly asleep, his involuntary movements showed quite clearly what he wanted. The tiny, almost unnoticeable thrusts were gaining force and amplitude rapidly. Luke smiled into his pillow. There was something incredibly incongruent in this domesticity, in this ‘morning after’ without any sex before, but in a nice way. He wasn’t feeling that scorching lust he used to associate with Kyp; instead the desire that he was experiencing now was softer, quieter, a glorious, suffusing warmth that filled him all the way to the bones. It called for a slow, lazy, sloppy fuck that goes by touch instead of vision and by comfort instead of intensity, and leaves both participants just slightly breathless and laughing. 

Luke reached back and put a hand on Kyp’s hip, pressing him even closer, getting a handful of firm, muscled flesh, and stroking the concavity above the hipbone that fitted his thumb so perfectly. Kyp moaned breathlessly into his neck, and then suddenly, in a span of a heartbeat, Luke felt his body freeze.

The dream was over.

Kyp swore quietly in something that, if Luke wasn’t mistaken, was Sullustan, and rolled away with a sound that seemed to be suspiciously close to a sob.

Luke almost lunged after him. “Kyp! What’s wrong?”

“No!”

“No what?” He put his hand on Kyp’s shoulder gently.

“Don’t touch me!”

“Why?”

“Because I said so, that’s why!”

“Not good enough.” 

“If you do, I’ll screw you silly. Don’t be deliberately obtuse.”

“And that would be a problem because?”

“Because it won’t be you. I’ll be just screwing the nearest available body – and I don’t repeat my mistakes twice.”

So Alema did manage to hit a sensitive spot. Luke thought about that for a minute and then turned Kyp on his back forcibly, pinning his shoulders.

“Not good enough. Once upon a time you asked me a question. Now I’m returning it to you. What scares you so much about sex, Kyp? More precisely, what scares you so much about sex with me? I don’t believe for a moment that you can really forget who you’re with – unless you’re working on it, hard. Stop lying. Look at me!”

Kyp opened his eyes and looked at Luke stubbornly. “Bastard.”

“Probably. How would I know? Answer the question, please. I think I deserve to know why you think you can deny that to both of us – _again_.”

“That’s for me to decide, isn’t it?” Kyp said defiantly.

“Yes, of course. But I want to know why. I need to know. You can give me that common courtesy, at least!” Suddenly the torrent of emotions, the sense of helpless frustration, his own and Kyp’s, became too much to manage, and he leaned forward, almost burying his nose in the black mass of hair scattered on the pillows, inhaling the familiar scent painfully, with fingers digging into Kyp’s shoulder muscles with such force that it was going to leave bruises. “You can’t hide that you want me. Want, huh! You crave it, and you need it. I want to give what you need. What is the problem?”

Kyp wrenched himself from under his hands with surprising strength, pushing him away violently. “You! You’re my vapin’ problem! Give up, huh? Let you get to me again, _that_ close, yeah? Excellent idea! And where it will leave me the next time you decide I don’t quite fit into your picture of ‘how the world should be’? A man can glue himself back together from pieces only so many times!”

“Kyp...”

“Fuck off!” The younger man flung himself from the bed, tottered on his feet for a moment, and fled. Only upon hearing a familiar click of the latch on the refresher door Luke understood that he, in fact, hadn’t left the house.

Scorched sands of Tatooine, but they were in a bigger mess than he thought. 

Luke jumped from the bed and headed to the ‘fresher. Everything was quiet inside – no sounds of running water or something else. He knocked at the door. “Come out.”

“No.”

“That’s ridiculous. You can’t sit there the whole day.”

“Why not? I like the accommodations. A loo, running water... I’ve had worse.”

Luke sighed and sat cross-legged across the door. “Whatever. I’m going to sit here and talk to you. You can plug your ears, of course... but I’m going to tell you anyway. I don’t repeat my mistakes twice, either. I know I treated you wrong and I’m sorry. It won’t happen again.”

He heard a snort from the other side. “Right. What exactly are you sorry for, pray tell me?”

“You need a list?”

“Of-kriffin’-course I do. Nothing makes me nauseous quite like a conditional apology, and I had one out of you already.”

“Excuse me?”

“The first meeting of the Council. Your ‘if you knew it back then, then I’m sorry’ speech. Like it made any kriffin’ difference if we could see the Vong in the Force or not, anyway. Some apology, Skywalker! You managed to invalidate everything I had been saying and doing since the beginning of the war – and you called that an apology? Forgive me if I don’t have faith in your apologies anymore!”

“Still want to punch me in the nose?”

“Badly.”

“Open the door, then.”

“You wish. Explanations, Skywalker – or you can just call your wife for a pick-up and leave – because I’m not going to let my basic emotions rule and let you lure me into thinking everything is nice and peachy between us!”

Luke closed his eyes and tried to get his thoughts in order. For some reason the very idea of listing and voicing all his faults made his stomach churn and his head hurt. And he had to, because Kyp was as serious as a proton torpedo, and if he couldn’t pass this crucial test, there was no hope of rebuilding any form of friendship between them. 

“I don’t know where to start,” he said finally.

“Start chronologically,” Kyp answered dryly. 

Luke thought carefully. “I’m sorry I awarded Mara a Master’s title when I did. That was insulting, for you and for everyone else.”

He heard a bitter chuckle from behind the door. “Barely warm, Skywalker. Barely. You’re still lightyears off target.”

“Are we playing a guessing game? Why won’t just tell me what you think my mistakes were?”

“I have been telling you that non-stop for three years. Ask yourself why it didn’t seem to matter before.”

“Because I wasn’t listening, not really.”

“That’s not an answer, it’s just restating of the fact. Don’t make me ask you leading questions. Right now you’ll tell me anything I want to hear, just to appease me, and I need that about as much as I need a death stick to make me feel better!” Kyp continued, in a slightly less agitated tone: “You have to understand by yourself, because otherwise you’ll repeat everything all over again – and I refuse to go through that the second time! I don’t want to start hating you.”

_Cilghal’s downcast eyes: “It has been unclear if you want to have friends, not subordinates.”_

He dropped his head on his tightly closed fists. “I stopped listening... no, I stopped asking. I haven’t really asked anyone’s opinion since... since too long. Except for Mara. And Leia, sometimes.”

“And now we’re starting to get somewhere. Don’t stop half-way,” Kyp said sarcastically. “Either be honest or kriff off – I’m not forcing you, you know. Yes, you did – and now I want to know why! Why people who were with you longest suddenly ceased to matter?”

The silence stretched. For all his penchant for brooding, Luke wasn’t exactly used to self-searching on that level, especially in a hurry. Right now casting his mind back was almost physically painful; the only thing he was able to think of was a constant, repetitive refrain: It’s all because of Mara, it’s all because of Mara... But it was something he had done, not Mara, and blaming her for his actions was disgusting and unfair. However, the catch phrase was playing in his head over and over, refusing to be silenced, and, finally, Luke surrendered. Mara was the heart of this issue somehow, and admitting to that didn’t equal blaming her; but it might give him some starting point to work from.

So back, back, all the way to Nirauan, for he had no doubt it all started there. He had returned from it a changed man, in more than one sense. So what had Mara said to him back then that could have prompted such a change of mind, and why did it happen?

“Kyp,” he said at last. “Do you ever want to start everything all over again... wipe the slate clean and do everything right this time around?”

He heard a snort. “Stupid question, Skywalker.”

“Probably not. Unlike me, you never shied from accepting responsibility for your actions and living with it.”

“That doesn’t mean I don’t wish for it to not ever happen.”

“I know. But you probably can understand how seductive this idea is. Mara said some things to me on Nirauan – things that made a lot of sense at the time, about my mistakes as a Master and the way I was leading the Order. And I was so tired of living with the memories of my mistakes and shortcomings that her words fell on very fertile ground. Not her fault; like I said, she did make a lot of sense at the time, but I took it closer to heart than I should have done. The idea of changing everything, starting all over again, on the right path this time, with new, fresh students, who didn’t have any predispositions and would be responsive to the new way of teaching... it was just too alluring to resist.”

“And we became inconvenient.”

“In more senses than one. As you remember, you all had a lot of objections to my ideas. You were also a reminder of my past, and I just couldn’t look at you and not remember how spectacularly I'd failed you. It’s not that I consciously decided to ignore you and the others... it was just easier to focus on the new students, and on Mara and Corran, who were relatively new as Jedi, but at the same time old and experienced enough for me to listen to. And, admit it, everything went all right for a time; I didn’t have any grounds for doubts.”

“You mean, no one was challenging you, since I got uncomfortable enough to make myself scarce, and so did Kirana and Cilghal. I bet it felt good.”

“So you understand?”

“Intellectually, yes. But you know, for me, that doesn’t amount to much if I can’t feel it, and I doubt I’ll ever be able to be comfortable without having someone to challenge me – the stronger the better.”

Luke shook his head, chuckling. “Promise me you won’t try to kill me with the toilet bowl.”

A brief pause, then a wary “What?” from behind the door was his only answer.

“You would have really made a spectacular Sith Lord. By temperament, you’re much more a Sith than a Jedi – and I realize how hard it is, to battle your natural predisposition through your entire life, and I respect you for that. But I doubt you’ll ever understand this need for...”

“...stability? Peace? Oh, you bet I do. It’s like sleep for a human’s body – something necessary to live. But you can’t spend your entire life sleeping. Everything that matters happens when you’re awake, in the constant struggle and hassle of our days. A conflict doesn’t equal...” Kyp broke off in the middle of the sentence, and said with disgust: “Why the kriff am I talking again? You’re not even half done with your apology.”

“Do you really want to know why?”

“It was a rhetorical question.”

“I know. Just to close this subject: I can’t really say I’m sorry for the decisions I made then. They had their good aspects, even if they weren’t entirely right. But what I am sorry for is how I treated you and other older Jedi. You all were with me from the very beginning, through thick and thin, and I had no right to disregard you in my quest for perfection.”

“’Right’, huh?”

Luke cringed. “Don’t be nitpicky.”

“I’m not. You were ashamed for a moment of what you said – just ask yourself why. Apology accepted, anyway.”

“Kyp?”

“Yes?”

“Come out. You have to eat.”

“I can wait. We’re not done yet.”

“You can’t sit there the entire day – I can be a slow thinker sometimes, as I’m sure you know.”

There was a hint of mirth in the answering voice. “Then you have to learn how to think faster. But I can give you a free shot. If you can identify the main reason I’m so mad at you, I’m out. Details can be discussed later...”

“Kyp?”

“Yes?” 

“What set you off that badly? I touched you before, I even kissed you, and you seemed to be all right with that. I don’t understand.”

There was a long silence, then Kyp said: “Answer my question, Skywalker. Then, probably, I won’t have to answer yours – it’s the same thing, after all.”

“It is?”

“Ultimately, yes. I even gave you a pretty clear lead already.”

Clear lead, clear lead... what could Kyp mean by that? And, suddenly, Luke understood, with a crystal chill, what was the worst insult he could dish out to his temperamental, passionate, outspoken friend, and he even knew that before, he just didn’t understand how deadly serious Kyp was in his seemingly off-handed remarks. “I’m sorry I didn’t fight with you,” he blurted out before he had an opportunity to question the idea, and get scared of its ramifications and meanings.

The only sound he heard in the head-spinning silence that followed his admission, was a shockingly loud click of the opening latch.

***

“Like it?”

Kyp, still with his mouth full, looked up at him with the patience of ten Jedi Masters in his eyes, then swallowed and answered: “No, of course not. I’m eating it just for the sake of perversion. Skywalker, don’t tell me she got you so domesticated that you require compliments about your cooking now!”

“Well, not that I require them, but I like to be appreciated once in a while.”

“I appreciate you,” Kyp said with offhandedness that felt just slightly artificial. “Just don’t ask me to compliment your cooking. It makes me feel like we’re a married couple who were married for so long they don’t have anything else to talk about anymore.”

The picture Kyp painted in this one sentence suddenly felt too real for Luke – something of a glimpse into one of the parallel realities, where it could have been a definite possibility. “I doubt we’d have had nothing to talk about.”

“Skywalker...”

“Don’t worry, I’m not getting ideas. I think I understand why you did what you did. It was a wise decision, but forgive me if I was unable to appreciate the wisdom at the time.”

Kyp averted his eyes. “Well, if I knew you were bent on becoming a galactic scandal anyway...”

Luke stared at him, surprised to the point of choking. “Don’t tell me that you denied even the chance for something more than a one-night-stand between us because you were afraid for my reputation!”

“Well...” Kyp seemed to be taken aback. “Mine, too, to be honest. Getting smeared all over the Holonet with either of us in the role of a vile seducer wouldn’t have done any good for us... what’s more important, it wouldn’t have done any good for the Order. We were still too shaky then for such extravagances.” 

“Why do you think we would have been...”

“Skywalker! You might like to live in a romantic universe of your own construction, but forgive me for not being able to disregard reality! I don’t see what you’re complaining about, though – you’re the one who’s happily married now.”

“Yes... but I still feel like we both missed something important. How does it fit with your life philosophy of never shying from a fight, by the way?”

“No one is perfect, all right? If it makes you feel any better, I regret it. I didn’t handle it well – another proof that you should never stifle a potential conflict. You felt bitter as a result, I felt guilty, and I think it’s one of the reasons why we’re finding ourselves in such a fine mess now. It would have been better just to fuck everything out and see where it would have led us. With the benefit of hindsight, I don’t believe we would have lasted long enough for the Universe to take notice, anyway. We’re way too different for that.”

“So are Mara and I.”

Kyp shrugged. “I’m still amazed you two manage to coexist in this relationship. But even if you can live with someone who’s so different, _I_ can’t. I’m too easily irritated for that.”

Luke thought about that for a moment and conceded that Kyp was probably right. And yet... 

“I still want it.”

The black eyebrows angled in puzzlement. “Want what?”

“To fuck it out, as you so eloquently put it. If you’re still so inclined.”

Kyp put his glass on the table with exaggerated care. “And get shot by your esteemed wife afterwards? No, thank you.”

Luke smiled. “Actually, it was Mara’s suggestion.”

“WHAT?”

“We have a very close bond, Kyp. She’s able to pick up my memories... and my dreams.”

“Oh. I see. Must be uncomfortable.”

“Quite, I believe. You never gave me the benefit of a closure, my friend. Not that I insist, but...”

“I know.” The green eyes hid behind the thick black eyelashes. “You’re a vapin’ temptation, Skywalker, but I can’t... not yet.”

“Luke.”

“What?”

“I’m getting tired of my last name.” 

Kyp smiled crookedly. “At least it’s not ‘Master Skywalker’. Unless you’re getting a thrill out of me calling you ‘Master’?”

Luke rolled his eyes. “You and Mara are really too alike. I’m getting tired of ‘Master’ jokes. What’s wrong with my name? You did call me Luke when we arrived here.”

“Slip of the tongue. Shows how wiped out I really was.”

“Why not, though?”

“Too personal. Too many memories.”

“What’s wrong with personal? Which reminds me - you didn’t answer my question.”

“Which one?”

“Don’t pretend. You know which one.”

The younger man sighed and pushed his plate aside. “You still haven’t figured it out?”

“No.”

“What you said about the seductiveness of stability and peace can be true for other things as well. We all have different weak spots, things that we want so much they are likely to blind us to reality, likely to make us forget our precautions and doubts, close our eyes, and dive in. For you it’s peace and stability. For me, it’s friendship and love. You’re offering both, now, and I’m so tempted to just stop listening to all the warning sirens in my head and give in, that it vapin’ hurts! But I know: if I do that, and let myself believe I have it, the next time you’ll give in to your fear of what you perceive as aggression and anger, and the conflict in general, and distance yourself from me again, that would be it. I might never recover again – love and friendship is what keeps me from falling back to the Dark, from despair, from indifference. I can’t afford to lose my faith in them. Do you really want that responsibility?”

Luke reached across the table, took Kyp’s hands in his and squeezed them, unable to squash his craving for a connection. “Don’t get me wrong, but I don’t think I have a choice. I don’t want it – I _need_ it.”

“I don’t follow you.”

“Like you said, we all have our weaknesses. I know I’m prone to fall in love with an idea and try to bend reality according to my wishes. It’s my nature, Kyp, just as active approach and practicality is yours. As too many people are telling me, I’m an idealist. But I tasted the results of such willful blindness, and I don’t like them at all. Next time when I feel the urge to do that, I’ll remember what it’s going to do to you. And I absolutely refuse to lose you – to the war, maybe, but certainly not over a philosophical issue.”

Kyp smiled wanly. “Scared you, didn’t I?”

“Terribly. But I needed the scare. Just like when I came so close to losing Ben... I admit I need a personal experience to understand the truth of simple things that you embrace as a given.”

“Like fighting for your children?”

“Yes. Your children, your family, your friends, your Galaxy. You were right, Kyp, when you said that I didn’t understand – remember, the last meeting on Coruscant, when you stormed out on me?”

“You really pissed me off.”

“I know. You were right, though – to understand something intellectually is not a full understanding. I wasn’t listening to my feelings, to what the Force was telling me. I tried to rationalize. And I needed a really bad kick to shatter those constructions of mine.”

Kyp shrugged. “Well, neither of us was in a good state of mind back then.”

“I remember. You weren’t pissed off only at me – you were pretty much pissed off at the entire Galaxy. What got you out of that mood back then, by the way?”

“As usual. Friendship. Love. My Dozen, most of all. All the people who risked their lives and safety to find me, to offer me help, to ask for a chance to fight with me as if it was an honor. Kriff, even right after that meeting... I walked in a pub on Coruscant and the owner refused to take money from me, said the food and drinks were on the house. It was... warming.”

“Zeth was right, you know?”

“About what?”

“You’re not alone. There are a lot of people who love you.”

Kyp freed his hands slowly and stood up. “I know. But, sue me, the love of some of them matters more to me than the others’.”


	9. Chapter 9

Luke slowed down, switching to a fast walk. It felt good to stretch his legs – as comfortable as the house was, he was starting to feel a little bit cramped there, especially after Kyp politely, but very firmly asked him to move from the bed to one of the sofas. After living for days in such a close proximity, the estrangement hurt; the distance Kyp was trying to put between them was filling the whole building. Six square meters of the bed were enough to feel comfortable for days; now, the whole area of the house was too small for Luke to feel truly welcome. He knew he had to give Kyp space; his friend not only needed to process everything that had been said and done in the last couple of days, but he needed to re-establish his physical independence after relying on Luke’s help with his every need for days – almost a week, in fact. 

But who said he had to like it?

To his surprise, when he rounded a bunch of small, widely branched trees that consisted, it seemed, of hard dark green arrowed leaves and strong, highly arched roots, he saw the familiar figure sitting at the edge of the surf in a cross-legged position, with his hands lying palms up on his knees. But Kyp wasn’t meditating – his back was too slumped for that. What was even more alarming, his head was ducked, with the curly bangs hanging loosely around his face, obscuring its expression. But even without seeing it, the posture spoke of tiredness and defeat too loudly for Luke not to become alarmed.

“Is something wrong?” he asked, lowering himself on the tightly packed sand at a respectful distance.

Kyp raised his head and blinked at him owlishly. “No, not necessarily. I was just trying to get in contact with Alleinn.”

“Who? Oh. Your son? You can establish a connection with him on a whim?”

“Yes. Not always, though, so there is nothing to be worried about. He’s probably not concentrating right now... or I’m still too weak to get through.”

“Or both. Plus, it’s a long way from Mon Calamari to Dathomir. Did you feel something wrong about him?”

“No. Just a check. I haven’t done that in too long a time. I must have had them really worried with my shielding tricks. Alleinn is not used to me shielding from him.”

“So why did you do it then?”

“Seemed to be a better option than him getting a full shitload of what was boiling inside of me.”

“He can get that much out of you?”

Kyp shrugged. “Who knows? This boy surprises the kriff out of me sometimes, and I haven’t seen him in three years. I have no idea what he can and can’t do now.” There was bitterness in Kyp’s voice, and Luke felt a strong pang of sympathy. He also had no idea what Ben could do now, how much he might have changed. 

“Damn this war,” he said with feeling. “We should have been with them; instead, we’re spending our days in endless killing, so they can live. And I’m afraid that when we see them again, they might not recognize these strangers.”

“How is Ben?”

“Good – as of two months ago, when we got the last message. Seems not to miss us at all.”

Kyp didn’t say anything, just shook his head sadly. 

“Tell me more about them,” Luke said, then hastily added: “If you want, of course.”

Kyp stood up, and Luke averted his eyes. The thin white pants he wore, which, obviously, belonged to Dohar, since they were too long and wide enough to barely stay in place indecently low on Kyp’s lean hips, were soaked wet and left little to imagination. For some reason the view hit Luke much harder than a total nakedness would have – in the last week he had got used to seeing Kyp naked. 

“Let’s return to the house. I’m hungry, and you can use a shower.”

Luke thought that the subject was closed, but, to his surprise, when he walked into the kitchen after taking a shower, Kyp was already sitting at the table, unclipping the holocubes from his necklace. 

“Go on, start the dinner – I could really eat a rancor right now.”

Luke knew he wasn’t joking – extensive use of the Force tended to play strange tricks with your metabolism. They all ate significantly more than an average being of the same size and species, and the Academy’s food bill was a constant source of jokes amongst everyone who knew this fact, for a lot of years.

“What do you want to eat?”

“I don’t really care. Something with a lot of proteins and carbohydrates. I trust your choice – you haven’t poisoned me so far.”

“Thanks for the note of confidence. Fried fish steaks are all right with you?”

“Fish is always all right. I’m Deyerian, remember?”

“Why is that pretty much the only affiliation we maintain with our native planets is the food?”

“I have no idea – maybe the tongue has memory cells?”

“You’re being silly.”

“So what?”

“Nothing. I just almost forgot you can.”

The dark green eyes slanted him a glance. “Anytime,” Kyp said flippantly. He waited until Luke finished with the preparations, turning the cubes in his hands, then said: “Here we go. Welcome – Seira Ti Durron, Zetha Ti Durron, Alleinn Kae Durron.” 

He activated one of the cubes and Luke froze, staring at the big holo, shockingly colorful in the dim setting of the kitchen. Kyp, somewhat younger and much less troubled than he was now, with his arms around the shoulders of two tall and willowy black-haired, gray-eyed pre-teen girls, dressed in the traditional Dathomiri leather garb. And right beside Kyp's face there was another one, of a laughing boy, perched on his back, with his hands wrapped around Kyp’s neck and his legs around Kyp’s waist. He looked so much like his father that Luke whistled in astonishment. Just about the only difference was that his hair was dark brown, not black, and the green eyes had a distinct blue tint instead of Kyp’s slant to brown. “Filswik, Kyp, he looks like a clone of you!” 

“In more ways than just appearance, I assure you,” Kyp said wryly. “Stubborn little rancor.”

“Is he as strong in the Force, too?”

“Yes, almost, and with some weird abilities I don’t have – I think he got them from his mother. If I can get him out of Dathomir, he’ll make a fortune in the mine industry – he can find a deposit of a certain metal or a mineral anywhere.”

“That’s interesting. I don’t think we have anyone with that particular skill in the Order.”

“That’s why I called it weird. Unfortunately, his mother died when he was only three years old, and now we can’t check...”

Luke sucked a breath. “His mother is dead?”

Kyp’s eyes became sad. “Yes. A damn freak accident – she got hit by a falling stone during a storm while she tried to cover others. I wasn’t there then... got in right in time to see her funeral pyre. Tanis was a very fine woman, and very strong in the Force – which was the primary reason why they chose her for me. Just a couple of weeks before that happened she’d told me she was discussing us having another child with the Mothers. She adored Alleinn – and didn’t mind at all that he’s not a girl.”

“Did you love her?”

“No. But we were close. She was a very good friend. I miss her... she had a knack for cheering me up. The things we did together made Mother Augwynne roll her eyes more than once. Alleinn inherited this penchant for mischief in triplicate, which is why his sisters are often likely to kill him. Honestly, before the war, I was very glad I’d decided he should stay on Dathomir. The very idea of him at the praxeum was enough to give me shudders.”

“Why didn’t you take him out at the beginning of the war?”

“If you bother to remember, you sent me on a mission – which I considered to be more important at the time. Who knew the Vong would move as quickly as they did?”

“I’m sorry,” Luke told him with a sigh. “I didn’t think that you might want to go to Dathomir – and I should have realized it’s directly on the path of the invasion.”

“Don’t blame yourself – we all were pretty confused back then. I wasn’t acknowledging the danger either... denial is a wonderful thing, isn’t it?”

“Except for the consequences. So who your son is living with now? Someone I know?”

“I think so. Eygenna Ti, Kirana’s little sister. Remember her? Dark blonde, gray eyes... of course, she was practically a child when you were there.”

“Wait, wait a minute. What did you say your girls’ middle name is?”

Kyp smiled broadly. “Ti. They are her daughters. Kirana’s nieces. Want to hear a real joke?”

“Don’t keep me in suspense,” Luke said wryly.

“ _They_ are the ones who were badgering me and everyone who bothered to listen about how much they want to go to the Academy and be Jedi Knights just like their aunt. And Alleinn, whom I could take with me at any point in time, was bent on staying on Dathomir and becoming more womanly than any woman. He’s very proud of his male-witch status and can’t refrain from rubbing in his sisters’ faces that he’s stronger in the Force than they are.”

“He is?”

“Yeah, whatever genes I have that answer for my Force potential, they seem to reside in the Y-chromosome. Which, I bet, is going to play merry hell with the Sisters’ idea of gender roles in the long run, if Alleinn is to have any male offspring. Seira and Zetha are pretty strong, but nowhere near my level. We’ll see when they grow up fully, but I suspect they are not much stronger than Kirana is.”

“That’s plenty.”

“Yes, but having a baby brother who can overpower them any day of the week is not doing any good to their self-esteem. They do love each other, though, for all their squabbling. They just have trouble tolerating each other sometimes.”

“So,” Luke asked, after flipping the steaks. “Which one is Seira and which one is Zetha? I have to admit, I can’t see any difference between them.”

Kyp snorted. “On holo, I usually can’t either, unless I remember how each of them was dressed at that particular day. In life, that’s not a problem – their Force signatures are different, although not by much.”

“Which answers one of the questions I’ve had since I learned about me and Leia. So identical twins’ signatures are not exactly the same?”

“No. I guess it’s not only the genes that figure in that. To answer your question, Zetha is on the right, Seira is on the left. What difference does it make?”

“No difference, I suspect. I’m just curious. Very pretty girls, and having two of them... If they get into the Academy - wherever we’ll have it after the war – I foresee a lot of broken hearts.”

Another snort. “You better hope it won’t be broken bones – they like to play rough.”

Luke laughed. “I wouldn’t expect anything different from Kirana Ti’s nieces.”

Kyp turned the cube, which shot down the holo they were looking at and ignited another – this time of Kyp and Kirana Ti, with their lightsabers crossed in what was, obviously, a demonstration for one of the girls and little Alleinn, who stood beside with wooden sabers, trying their best to copy their elders.

“You sure started them early,” noticed Luke, putting the food on the plates. 

“Why not? They were learning how to fight since they were old enough to walk. I hoped you would take Alleinn as your apprentice...”

“Why me? Why not you?”

“We’re too alike. I want him to have other influences... and having another authority figure won’t hurt him either. But now, I guess, Kirana will have the privilege – she is there, we are not.”

Luke garnished the fish and took a bite. Hmmm. He sure outdid himself – either that or Dohar Irsenna knew which stores to visit for his food shopping. Or was it Taira? He would have to ask them about that – the steak was delicious even by his unsophisticated standards. 

“I can’t believe it!” Kyp’s exclamation jerked him out of his gastronomic rapture.

“You can’t believe what?”

“That’s rainbow fish. I thought it wasn’t grown anywhere but on Deyer – and since the Empire poisoned the waters there, nowhere. I haven’t seen it since I was eight! Where the kriff did Dohar manage to find it?” Kyp closed his eyes, chewing with a very strange expression on his face. “It’s like a trip down damn memory lane. Mother made it for dinner the day before... before. I wanted to have another one, but she said ‘tomorrow’... and could you believe, for days after that, through all the horror that was happening with us, I couldn’t stop being sorry that she hadn’t allowed me that second serving!” He looked at his plate with a smile on his face that spoke all too plainly that he was smiling so he wouldn’t start crying. “Well, better late than never.” 

He continued to eat. Luke continued to pretend he wasn’t noticing the painful set of his features, but the food didn’t taste even half as good anymore.

“I would have been such a huge disappointment to them,” Kyp said suddenly.

Luke put down the fork in surprise. “For Force’s sake, why?”

“Take your idealism and pacifism and multiply it many times over. You’ll get the picture. Deyer was an attempt to build an ideal society, where everyone would have been equal, everyone served a term in the power structures, no wars, no violence. Life is good, the Universe is good, everyone is good, and if someone isn’t, he, of course, is just honestly mistaken, and all it’d take to make him quit would be just explaining his mistake to him. Which was exactly what they tried to attempt with Palpatine with predictable results. I can imagine what they would have thought about their children – Zeth, a stormtrooper, a consummate killer, by his own admission, and me, a former Sith, a destroyer of planets, and a warrior Jedi. I bet they would have been thrilled.”

“I think they would have understood, Kyp.”

Kyp answered with a harsh, painful laugh. “Right. You don’t know what you’re talking about. Even being dumped in the mines of Kessel didn’t teach them anything. They continued to sermonize about right and wrong to the hardened criminals. Stupid, stupid, stupid!”

“They did what they thought was the right thing to do.”

“Yes! Serving their dumb unrealistic ideations! All it did was get them killed at the first opportunity!”

“Kyp...”

“Leaving me alone, without support, without protection, a plaything for anyone who’d have liked to... oh, kriff!”

“Kyp!”

He was too late. Kyp was already out of the chair and running to the door, stupidly, blindly, hitting the doorpost with his shoulder, tripping over a rug on the floor, and not even noticing. In a moment he was gone.

Luke looked at the plates with half-eaten food and decided he wouldn’t ask Dohar Irsenna anything. He doubted he would ever be able to eat rainbow fish again.

He cleaned everything methodically, throwing out not only the remains of their aborted dinner, but also all the fish he was able to find in the storage unit, and putting everything in the disintegrator. The mundane task helped to calm him down; now he hoped he would be able to talk to Kyp without falling prey to impotent rage himself.

Mara had been right; actually, she had been right about very nearly everything so far, but, Force, how he wished for her to be wrong in this case! He had no idea Kyp’s issues with abandonment went so far back; no wonder he didn’t trust anyone not to leave him, if he blamed his own parents for leaving him alone, an easy target for all sorts of abuse. Luke grimaced. He knew he might never be able to convince Kyp he wasn’t going to be abandoned again, at least not by him, but it was still worth a try.

He put some fruits and two bottles of water into a small backpack, and headed out, falling into a fast jog immediately. No way he was leaving Kyp alone; not ever, if it was up to him.

To his surprise, Kyp wasn’t anywhere on the beach; after a short search, Luke found him inland, up the hill, in a small clearing between some sharp-edged rocks and thorny overgrown bushesю He was lying prone on the dry, infertile ground, crying like a lost child – loudly and unashamedly. Luke didn’t bother to talk to Kyp, just sat beside him, and lifted the overheated, damp body into a sitting position, putting the wet, dirty face on his shoulder and hugging his friend tightly. At first, Kyp seemed not to notice the change in the arrangement, but in a minute Luke saw his hands lifting, slowly – and, suddenly, Kyp was hugging him with equal force, clutching to him as if he was the only fellow being in the world.

They sat like that long enough for Luke’s legs to start getting numb. Gradually, Kyp’s half-sobs, half-wails started to subside, and Luke risked stroking his head and back, in slow, rhythmic motions, like he saw Leia and Han doing so many times when one of their children was having hysterics. “I’m here, Kyp,” he whispered into his ear. “I won’t abandon you. I promise. Ideology be damned.”

Kyp sniffled. “Don’t make promises... you can’t keep.”

“I can.”

“No... you can’t,” he managed between sniffles and hiccups. “It might be me or Ben one day... just like it happened with Jaina... and you’ll leave. I don’t need... your promises.”

“What do you need from me, then?” Luke asked gently.

“Just... be here, when you can. Don’t... sacrifice me for your kriffin’ ideas. For people... that I can understand. Pity that... the moron who invented this concept of ideas being more important than people... is long dead. I would have liked to strangle him... slowly... just so he could feel what it’s like... to be sacrificed for someone’s idea.”

“Funny,” Luke said, smiling.

“Wwwwhat?”

“I can’t even chastise you for that. You’re right. Next time you think I’m likely to get too ideological, just say ‘ewok battle dance’.”

Kyp lifted his head, looking at Luke with eyes that seemed even more green for the bloodshot whites that surrounded the irises. “What?” he asked again, dumbfounded.

“’Ewok battle dance’,” Luke repeated with a completely serious face. “It's a code phrase. Ever heard about the concept of code phrases?”

Kyp suddenly started laughing, as hysterically as he was crying just a couple of minutes ago. “You’re crazy. I can imagine that scene... at some Jedi meeting, right in the middle of one of your pompous speeches.”

“I’m not pompous. I’m inspiring!”

“Yes, in the same way as heartburn in the middle of the night is inspiring. Won’t let you fall asleep, but makes you damn uncomfortable.”

“Laugh for now, oh witty one. I’ll see how you manage public speeches when you are leading the Order.”

Kyp leaned back abruptly. “That was a stupid joke, Skywalker.”

“I’m not joking. Relax, you still have time. A lot of it, probably. I don’t plan to retire anytime soon. But in case I get killed – my will is loaded with the two most respectable juridical organizations in this Galaxy. I did it two months ago, before Ebaq 9.”

Kyp looked at him intently, searching his face for clues. “You’re not joking,” he said at last, as if trying to comprehend this fact.

“No.”

“What about the others?”

“The Masters? I don’t think they’d disapprove – not even Mara. And I don’t see you attempting to take charge against their will, anyway.”

“Well, no, but... what about Jacen? Jaina? Ben?”

“Contrary to popular belief,” Luke said dryly. “I don’t view the Jedi Order as a family enterprise. The one who is most suited to leadership, should lead. Right now it’s, undoubtedly, you. In the future,” Luke shrugged, “who knows. But I don’t think I’m going to change my mind on that. So you see,” he smiled at the younger man, “I’m very invested in your well-being. I do want to retire at some point and live a nice, quiet, comfortable life... for a change.”

Kyp obviously wanted to say something, but yawned hugely instead. “Kriff, I’m wiped,” he mumbled. “You sure picked the right time to drop that one on me – I can’t fight you... don’t have any energy.”

“Well, my friend,” Luke answered with a smile. “You can fight me with everything you have, but I don’t think it’s going to change anything. Just like me, you don’t exactly have a choice.”

***

“Kyp?”

“Hmmm?”

“You’re not asleep.”

“Such a keen observation, Skywalker, I’m amazed. The Force sent you this revelation, no doubt.”

“That, or the fact that you changed position three times in the last two minutes. What’s the matter?”

“Just getting antsy.”

“Peace and quiet are getting to you?”

“It’s an illusion. The war is still out there. I can feel it. All the gore, all the grief, and all the battle rage.”

“And all the hate.”

“Yes.”

“We have to find out what caused this hypersensitivity of yours.”

“Why do you think we have to?”

“It’s not normal, Kyp.”

“I’m not normal, period.”

“True, but...”

“Probably it’s something that was supposed to happen.”

“Will of the Force?”

“Yes.”

“Do you really think so?”

“No. But it would’ve made sense.”

“I don’t see what you mean.”

“So I wouldn’t be tempted to chicken out of this war. No matter how tired of it I got.”

“Space station trash.”

“What?”

“Rubbish. Nonsense. Bantha shit. Is that more understandable?”

“Why?”

“Because you have to devote a very big portion of your energy to maintaining your shields in order not to go crazy. It must impede your fighting abilities – as a pilot, as a ground fighter, and I don’t even want to think what it might to do with your capability for battle meld! How have you been managing it before, for Sarlacc’s sake?”

“I didn’t.”

“Don’t give me that crap. I felt you in the meld on Ebaq 9.”

“It started after that.”

“Thank the Force.”

“Why?”

“I was afraid that it had been going on for a while and I started to notice only now.”

“No, it’s a recent development.”

“Kyp?”

“Yes?”

“Can it be because of what happened with Jaina?”

“Why do you think so?”

“Simple logic. It’s the only thing that happened in that battle that could have affected you strongly.”

“So, you know?”

“That you love her? You were pretty talkative in your delirium.”

“Kriff...”

“What did she say to you that you’re so afraid she’ll leave you?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Yes, it does.”

“I don’t want to talk about that.”

“You have to.”

“Can’t imagine why.”

“Because it’s a fear you have to deal with. Remember what you told me back then on Yavin 4? You have to learn how to live with your fears. Otherwise...”

“I know. I vapin’ know! I’m just not ready to talk about that yet.”

“That’s all right. Whenever you’re ready. We have time.”

“Luke?”

“Yes?”

“Come to bed.”

And he did. Luke wrapped his love around Kyp like an impenetrable cocoon, cradling him inside. In just a couple of minutes he felt Kyp’s body relax in the circle of his hands. In another minute, all he could hear was a quiet, rhythmic sound of shallow breathing.

Kyp was asleep.


	10. Chapter 10

That invitation to the bed had been the end of any attempt from Kyp’s side to put barriers between them, physical or verbal. By unvoiced mutual agreement, they hadn’t raised the issue of having sex again, but other than that, Kyp not only allowed Luke to get close – he basked in that closeness, reveled in it. With anyone else, in any other circumstances, Luke might have called it clinginess, but in this case, he was just insanely glad that finally, finally, Kyp believed him, and allowed himself to accept what Luke was eager to give.

Aside from the obligatorily private visits to the ‘fresher, there never had been a distance of more than three steps between them; they did everything together, or, rather, Luke did. Kyp just hung around, sometimes helping with the chores, but mostly just talking, talking as if he hadn’t talked with anyone in years – about his children and his plans for them, about his friends, dead and alive – Dorsk, Miko, Cilghal, Tanis, Eygenna and Kirana Ti, Octa – and, finally, about Jaina. Kyp’s description of the so-called picnic on the roof of the main building on Borleias, given in his trademark sarcastically merciless style, made Luke flush in admittedly irrational shame for the behavior of his niece.

“Why did you allow her to treat you like that?”

“She caught me unawares. I was still fooling myself back then, thinking that she’s just a friend I like to have around, with, well, some sexual attraction involved, but that wouldn’t be new. I slept with almost all of my friends at some point in time; get to someone close enough, and you start to find something to be attracted to, at least that’s how it works for me. I was even somewhat amused at the beginning – it all was so teenager-ish, ‘let’s clarify this thing between us’, ‘he’s here because he’s involved too’. So youthfully magnanimous. I felt like a lyceum graduate that I had never had the opportunity to be. I decided to play along – I needed some innocent amusement. And then she turned it to the issues of trust and companionship, and I still wonder if she even knew what she was doing with that ‘you don’t have to be alone anymore’ speech. And before I knew it, I was giving up to my basic instincts – again, kriff it.”

“Basic instincts?”

Kyp laughed ruefully. “Same old, same old. Some people,” he looked at Luke wryly, “are spending half of their life denying themselves the pleasures of sex, and then snap out and screw the first living being around.” 

Luke chuckled, a bit self-consciously.

“...seeee, that’s what normal people mean when they say ‘basic instinct’. But I’m not normal, so I just had to invent something different.”

“So what does it mean for you?”

Kyp fidgeted in his chair. “I don’t usually get along with people on one-two-three, like that.” He snapped his fingers. “Kessel tends to make everyone paranoid and aloof. But, once in a while, I feel that urge to give my friendship and commitment on the spot, in the spur of the moment. Just because I want it reciprocated too vapin’ much. Sometimes it plays out really well, like with Han and a couple of others. Sometimes... not so. But that ‘partners until death’ stuff was just too tempting. It only hit me way afterwards that she had no idea what she was offering and what it might mean to me.”

“Did she?”

“She’s just too vapin’ young to understand,” Kyp answered with a pained grimace. “Just my luck, to fall for a girl who has the full potential to be my equal, but is so young that she still considers a year to be a distant future, and so emotionally immature that she honestly thinks everything that happens around is about her. Love, commitment – those are still just words for Jaina, without any substance that real life experience puts into them. I don’t even want to get into her so-called ‘love’ for Fel – she uses him as an emotional crutch, but since he seems not to have any qualms about that, I keep quiet. Whatever floats their boat. 

“I’m the one who made a mistake, when after Hapes I started to think she’d grown up enough to really understand me. I said yes; I agreed to her proposition, and, as you very well know, I always keep my word - but I’m starting to think that when it finally penetrates her thick Solo skull that she just might not be killed in the next battle, or the one after that, and that I need much more from this arrangement than the empty title of her ‘partner’, she’ll try to wiggle out of it. She needed me back then, and she thought it’d be over before she stopped needing me, but I have no idea what she’ll do when she realizes _I_ might need _her_.”

“She’s not a coward, Kyp.”

“No, just honestly egocentric, like most people her age. It takes a very different kind of courage, Luke. You should understand – you chickened out of our bond for years, after all. Without, as you admit, even realizing what you were doing. It’s not a walk in the park, even to simply be my friend. And partnership is something that goes way beyond that.”

“Is that all you want from her – partnership?”

Kyp looked at him askance. “Oh, that’s plenty. I don’t even know if she can manage that... and of course I want more! But what I want doesn’t really matter. She can’t give me more than she’s capable of, and right now it’s not a lot. Zeth was kind of wrong on that – I guess he doesn’t know me as well as he imagines he does – yes, brother, I can feel you rolling your immaterial eyes, but that’s true. I’m not being noble. An emotional cripple like Fel is exactly what she can manage for now. I can get her to bed, and I know that one night with me can make her forget about any other males for a loooong time – not that it’d be hard to impress such a novice. But what would be the use? The issues are not going to go away, and she wouldn’t grow up overnight because of a good fuck. If all I wanted was sex – now, wouldn’t that be pathetic?”

“If you’re not fixated on sex with her, what was that debacle with Alema all about then?”

“You know?” Kyp sighed and answered his own question. “Yes, of course you know. I guess the whole Galaxy does – Alema really knows how to pick her moments. I can’t even be really angry at her for that – I did piss her off pretty badly.”

“I have to admit, I was wondering what could have made her so mad as to kick you out.”

Kyp shrugged. “The most banal thing of all. I called her by Jaina’s name in bed. But it was just about the only thing that was guaranteed to set her off like a plasma grenade.”

“Why?”

“She’s a former pleasure slave, Luke. The only thing she absolutely requires of her bedmates is that they see _her_ while in bed with her. You might not love her, you might just want to have a careless fuck to exercise your hormones, but you have to want it with her. She’s had enough of being used like a personless fuck meat. That’s something I can sympathize with fully, and the only thing that I can say in my defense is that I didn’t intend to use her as a substitute for Jaina. It just sneaked up on me. You said you don’t believe I can forget who I’m with without working on it... well, apparently I can. Either that, or my subconscious did all the work without me noticing. I guess that was my first serious warning that things were much more dire than I thought them to be.”

“When was that?”

“On Borleias, shortly before we left it. I apologized, of course, but the only thing it bought me was that the first time, she kicked me out without making a scene.”

“So why did you return to her? Kyp, that was just plain stupid! You should have realized it wouldn’t go well.”

Kyp just shook his head. “As you could have noticed, I haven’t exactly been rational lately.”

“Still...”

“Luke, I just couldn’t live in a constant state that is vulgarly, but very aptly, named ‘blue balls’! I’m just not used to living that long without sex, and after that accident, I was so afraid it might happen again... just imagine if I blurted something like that to someone I just picked up for a one-night-stand! I thought... no, I hoped, that Alema might feel charitable. She already knew, and hadn’t told anyone. We were good together – I don’t think she’d had such fantastic sex in years, judging by her enthusiasm, so I thought it might outweigh her sensibilities. It didn’t.”

“Instead you just added insult to another insult.”

“Yeah...”

Luke put a cup of steaming tea on a small table before Kyp and sat on the opposite sofa with his. “Drink. So what are you going to do now? I don’t believe that trying to continue this stint in celibacy would do you any good.”

Kyp looked at him helplessly. “I don’t know.”

“I know you’re not stuck on gender... probably it would be different with a man?”

“I might not be stuck on gender, as you put it... but, Luke, it makes a difference to me, and a big one. I can’t have an affair with a man lightly... even if it’s just a one night. It’s much more emotionally charged for me.”

“Kessel?”

Kyp just nodded.

“I never asked you, and, in fact, I never even thought about what you must have gone through there, until Mara pointed that out to me, but, Kyp... I’m amazed you have such a relatively healthy attitude toward sex at all. How did you manage?”

His friend looked at him with a crooked smile. “A lot of room you have to judge what’s healthy and what’s not in this respect.”

Luke laughed quietly. “I learned a lot since that night, Kyp. A lot. Better late than never, yeah?”

An inquisitive tilt of black-haired head. “And how did you do that? I think I’d have heard rumors in the Academy, if...”

Luke sipped his tea, hiding his smile in the cup. “Ever heard of Zeltros?”

“Oh, Force...” Kyp moaned. “That’s one planet I have always been afraid to visit!”

“Afraid? Why in the sands of Tatooine?”

“I’m afraid I’ll be tempted never to leave. They have this thing about Jedi, don’t they?”

“Yes, and I think they will be even more ecstatic about you in particular – you have the same empathic abilities they have. If you are in the mood to just relax and let yourself be totally pampered and fucked out of your mind in the nicest way possible, go there. They won’t disappoint.”

“I know. I had a couple of encounters with Zeltrons. How long were you there?”

“Long enough.” Luke smiled a pleased, secretive smile. “But leaving is not a problem, actually... you’ll get tired of it even sooner than I did, I think. Remember that saying? ‘Too much of a good thing is a bad thing’, I think it is, or something like that.”

“Yes, I know. It’s Chandrilian. All right, consider me convinced. As soon as the war is over...”

“You have a ton of unused days off, I bet. Why wait until then?” 

“Going to a world chock full of empaths while I still can’t figure out what to do with my own empathy seems just a bit unwise, don’t you think?”

“Maybe not. Maybe they could suggest something useful.”

“None of the Zeltrons I knew had any command over their natural empathy, so my guess would be no. I have to figure it out myself.”

“How is it now?”

“Pretty good, actually. I still feel everything, but it’s less acute, as if diffused or dimmed by some barrier. Probably being out of a big city helps.”

Luke was very pleased to hear that. So his efforts to wrap his own presence, his inner calm and his love around his friend were working. If he was right, that absence of constant emotional irritation might help Kyp to regain some of his natural barriers. A scraped skin could only heal if it wasn’t scraped over and over again. 

“I still hope, probably foolishly, that it’ll go away just as suddenly as it came.”

“It might. When did it start?”

“Right after Ebaq 9, when I got out of the meld. Probably being in it for as long as I did has something to do with it...”

“Kyp,” Luke interrupted him. “How much of the panic and dread I felt in the meld after we heard that Tsavong Lah was still alive and trying to take Jaina was yours? Honestly.”

Kyp suddenly paled so much that his newly tanned face assumed a grayish yellow color. “A lot. I don’t know... I hadn’t been that scared since I realized I might not be in time to save Zeth... probably not even then. At Carida, I still believed I’d get through – I believed to the last moment. At Ebaq, I knew there was nothing I could do... absolutely nothing. Luke... the scariest thing is that I don’t remember what happened. I blacked out. Not entirely, I guess – I’m still alive, which means my reflexes were still working. But I have no memory at all about the time between that moment and the one when we felt Tesar announcing that Tsavong Lah is dead and they need a medical droid.”

Luke shook his head. “Oh boy. We need to find out what happened – that just might be the key.”

“No.”

“Why?”

“Listen, if something or someone erased my memories, no matter how much I hate this thought, we can’t do anything about that. And if I just repressed it, don’t you think that I might have had a damn good reason to do that? What if dragging it to the surface will make everything worse? What if my psyche is trying to protect me?”

_I’m acutely reluctant to intrude in something that might be an extreme, but natural way of dealing with the problem..._

Luke blinked, with the echo from Cilghal’s words still resonating in his mind. “All right, I admit it might be prudent not to do anything as drastic as restoring your memory if you can deal with the problem some other way. Let’s wait and see what happens... probably your stress level contributed to this sensitivity, and as soon as you get enough rest and resolve other issues, it’ll go down.”

“I’d like to believe so.”

“Me too. You’re managing pretty well now, after all, and that’s with minimal shielding. I find that encouraging.”

Kyp just nodded. They lapsed into silence, which wasn’t either strained or uncomfortable.

“Jaina will grow up,” Luke said suddenly. “I know it’s hard on you, but just be patient.”

“Well, as Taira was so kind as to remind me, I’m not getting any younger.”

Luke gave him a mockingly hurt look. “I must be already dead of old age, then. Kyp, you’re only thirty three!”

“Thirty four, almost... feels like ninety sometimes. I’m not talking about my physical age, Luke.”

“What’re you talking about then?”

“This... tiredness of soul. I’m afraid by the time she’ll come around it might be too late for me. I might start to feel too comfortable with loneliness by then.”

“Doesn’t seem to me that you’re in danger of that. You said it yourself – love and friendship.”

“It’s becoming harder and harder with every year. I don’t know how many more disappointments I can take before I stop bothering.”

“I won’t let you.”

That earned him a sarcastic stare. “How?”

Luke smiled, unperturbed. “I’ll think of something.”

“Something like this time?”

“Uh-huh.”

“You’re just lucky I have this unexplainable tendency to conform to your wishes, Skywalker, not to mention I felt too crappy to really put up a good fight. The idea, admit it, was ludicrous. I don’t take well to imprisonment – of any kind.”

“You’d have preferred to stay in Coral City?”

The corners of Kyp’s lips lifted in a reluctant smile. “No. All I say is – don’t get too cocky. I’m not always that easy.”

Luke laughed. “You call that easy?”

“Could have been worse.”

“I’ve seen your ‘worse’, Kyp. I’m not scared.” Kyp flashed him a brief, cutting glance, and Luke made himself admit: “Well, probably a little.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Not enough to stop me, you can trust me on this. And if I won’t think of something, Han will.”

“Yeah,” Kyp answered with a soft smile. “He will. Like always.”

“Does he know, by the way?”

“About me and Jaina? No, not in detail. But he knows I love her. I guess I was a little too obvious after that scare she gave me on Ebaq.”

“And?”

“Well, as you can see, I’m still alive.” Kyp sniggered. “I actually felt sorry for him – the protectiveness he feels toward Jaina and toward me are existing on perpendicular vectors in this case. But all he said was ‘She’s still too young for you’. I said that I know that like no one else.”

“And?”

“You’re becoming repetitive. Nothing. He just hugged me. He was sad. Regretful, even. I think he likes the idea of having me as his son-in-law, but understands that it’s just plainly unrealistic.”

“Yet.”

“I’d have liked to think so, but...”

“Kyp,” Luke interrupted him. “If there is one thing you have that I always have been envious about, it’s your zest for life, your openness to new things and new experiences. And something like that doesn’t change, it’s there, in your core, just like your stubborn pride – it’ll be there until the day you die. You’re just coming out of a fit of depression, not to mention a serious illness. It might seem like everything is going straight to a black hole, but you have to remember, it’s just a temporary dive. You’ve been through that before. You’ll come through again. Just don’t lose hope.”

“I love when you’re stating obvious things like it’s some grand revelation.”

Luke leaned forward suddenly, making Kyp startle. “Obvious, you say? That’s why you were feeding me ‘buts’ and ‘I’d like to believe sos’ for the last couple of days? It may be obvious, but do you really understand it here?” He pointed to Kyp’s chest. “Or is it just an intellectual understanding?”

Kyp shook his head. “No.”

“No to what?”

“No to both.” He smiled. “Ask me again in a couple of days – my attention span is still too short right now, and I’m tired. Tell me about Zeltros. Something pleasant. Something just this side of ridiculous.”

Luke face became thoughtful, but then it lightened up. “Oh, I know. Ridiculous for sure, and, I bet, for you the amusement value will be pretty high.”

“Go on,” Kyp said lazily, leaning his head back and closing his eyes.

“Well, let’s begin with the beginning. I didn’t come there as Luke Skywalker, of course – not that I was ashamed of being caught having a good time, but it would have been just too intimidating, not to mention that Leia would not have appreciated having to hold a press-conference over that.”

Kyp sniggered. “Imagining your dear sister trying to explain that to the public is already hugely amusing. I bet she’d have lost her patience in less than five minutes and left 3PO to answer the questions... which would have led to a lengthy and boring lecture for the cream of the crop of galactic media about anatomy and physiology of a healthy human male, as we know now.”

Luke looked at him fondly. “You’ve got it – that picture had been haunting my imagination for quite a while. So, of course, I decided to use a disguise. But, since I didn’t want to be bothered with anything too complicated, I decided that dyeing my hair and changing the style of my clothing would be enough. And growing a beard, of course – my chin is probably my most recognizable feature. To my dismay, I proved to be not exactly a beard man material – what deigned to grow on my face was barely enough to form a goatee, but I decided it was sufficient. It covered the cleft, so, the objective was accomplished.

“I dyed my hair a dark brown color and, truth to be told, it took me a while to get used to my own reflection in a mirror. It’s amazing what such a simple thing can do to a face.”

“I know,” Kyp said unenthusiastically. “I tried going blond once – an utter disaster. My appearance just screamed: ‘Look, here is an idiot who tries to hide his black hair.’ I settled on dark red after that, and couldn’t help wincing each time I saw myself in a mirror – I looked like your wife’s bastard brother!”

“Oh? Do you have holos, by any chance?”

“In your dreams.”

“Well, it was worth a try. All right, the next thing was the clothes. I decided I needed something colorful, not my usual blacks and browns, and certainly not orange. I had to dismiss red and yellow outright – I looked definitely tacky in them. Blue was too much like me – the real me. I didn’t feel unrecognizable enough in it. So, I settled on green. Then, feeling sufficiently removed from my boring self, I booked a seat on a passenger cruiser.

“I’ll spare you the details for now. Let’s just say that I didn’t even have to fulfill the obligatory ‘a Jedi walked into a bar’ cliché. I didn’t even get a chance to check myself into a hotel for... three days, at least. The hard part proved to be not allowing myself to be picked up too often. In a couple of weeks, I started to tire of a new face in my bed every twelve hours or so, and kind of settled down with a girl who worked as an administrator in my hotel, and her younger half-brother.”

Kyp lifted his eyebrows in surprise, but didn’t say anything.

“She was very... knowledgeable about all kinds of entertainment that could be found on Zeltros, and that says something, believe me. I ended up not only getting quite extensive experience in bed – they dragged me through the full range of restaurants, dance halls, outdoor trips, art galleries, concerts, and amusement parks. The latter proved to be my downfall. I let it slip once that I was a pilot – they asked about my job, and that was the most convenient thing I could think of, that didn’t require any lying. Unfortunately, Jago just happened to be a pilot as well, and he challenged me to a match on simulators during one of our trips. He was pretty good, and I, um, got a little carried away, beating the record they had by quite a margin.

“Shortly after that I got a distinct feeling that I was being followed, but before I got an opportunity to shake Fae and Jago off and find out who it was, and what it was about, the feeling disappeared. I was sufficiently happy and careless by then to just forget about that altogether. Imagine my surprise when, in a couple of days, Jago asked me shyly if I am who the news is saying I am. 

“What can I say? The aforementioned picture of Leia storming out of a press-conference, rather than explaining what exactly her brother, the head of the Jedi Order, is doing living it up sandwiched between two Zeltrons on the most famous pleasure planet in the galaxy, appeared before my eyes immediately. Fortunately, I hadn’t got a chance to open my mouth and answer before he handed me an infopad. The headline, in big bold letters, said: ‘Is the star of Rogue Squadron getting tired of his marriage?’ And then, in slightly smaller size: ‘Their ace pilot and ex-CorSec member, Corran Horn, has been seen burning his candle at both ends on Zeltros’, accompanied by the fortunately blurry shots of me dancing with Fae and Jago.”

Kyp stared at him with the expression of a fish jerked suddenly out of the water and then burst out laughing. “Oh, skies black and blue! Oh, nine Corellian hells! Luke, you’ve made my day! No, make it the whole week. All this sordid week was worth it for hearing that! I can just imagine what Mirax had to say about that.”

“Well, fortunately – or unfortunately, from your point of view – Corran had a blasterproof alibi. He was on a mission with the rest of the squadron at the time. But it had taken him some amount of talking to convince Mirax of that, all while dodging various sharp and blunt flying objects, as I found out later.”

By that point Kyp was in tears, half-sitting, half-lying limply across his sofa. “That’s priceless,” he squeezed out between giggles. “I so wish I’d known that earlier. I’d have found a way to make his life nicely miserable. I owe him something for all the verbal smears he’s put on my name through the years.”

“Oh no,” Luke said in horror. “Don’t. Just don’t, all right? If you drag it into the light again, someone just might get smart and figure it out! And then you’ll have to deal with Leia and Mara instead of Mirax.”

Kyp, still wiping off the moisture from his face, nodded. “All right, consider me convinced. But you’re an awful tease, Luke! Letting something like that out and forbidding me to use it... that’s villainy!” 

“You’ll survive. How do you know what he was saying about you, by the way?”

“I still can’t figure out how he made it into CorSec", Kyp answered, rolling his eyes. "This man just doesn’t know when to keep his mouth shut. He probably thinks he and I are living in parallel realities. Everybody he talks to has friends, and his friends have friends, and some of them just happen to be my friends as well. We’re too small a community for it to be any other way. I know he’s your friend, Luke, but, admit it, his feelings toward me aren’t exactly becoming for a Jedi.”

Luke made a face. “I know. I had a couple of talks with him about that, but to no avail. Thanks for not making a public issue out of that. We don’t need another scandal with everyone taking sides.”

Kyp looked at him with sudden coldness. “The last time, I remember, your ‘talk’ with him consisted of a mild reprimand on the grounds that ‘talking like that compounds the problem we have with Kyp and his faction’. And that was when he was talking about _killing me_. If you think it’s going to impress him, you’re dead wrong. He wants for everyone to have a problem with me, and just can’t reconcile himself to the fact that most people don’t.”

“They really reeled you up then, didn’t they?” Luke asked with regret.

The green eyes staring at him darkened. “Not them. _You_. I expected something like that from them – I felt dirty and slimy from the hate they were oozing. But you! Was it the only thing that you were able to think of telling them? That discussing ways of killing me with their lips smacking is incorrect because it might have _political consequences_?”

“Kyp...”

“Don’t bother,” Kyp answered tiredly. “I can recite all your reasons and probably add a couple that you never thought of, but it doesn’t make it any less painful. Besides, it’s in the past... I hope.”

“It is.” Luke sighed. “I wish I could make up to you for that.”

“You already did. It’ll just take time to heal, sorry. I’m still not used to having you back.”

“Oh, Kyp...” Luke smiled through a lump in his throat. “Me too.”

They lapsed into silence momentarily, and Luke used that time to fully take in the picture Kyp presented, draped across the back of the sofa, with his head thrown back, his strong hands splayed and long legs, draped only in the same sheer white pants, stretched out. The chiseled, handsome face was still a little too thin and haggard, but Kyp was getting back to his normal form; the smooth skin shone with a fresh tan, and the only darkness under the almond-shaped eyes were the shadows of long eyelashes.

Not for the first time since he embarked on that adventure, Luke admitted to himself that he, possibly, hadn’t been completely honest with Mara – or, rather, he hadn’t realized the full truth when he spoke to her. 

He loved Kyp. Not like he loved Mara – less, almost certainly; differently, for sure. But not just as a friend or a student, either. It was a real love, not just a mix of lust and friendship. The warm feeling that suffused him, inside and out, and made his heart skip a beat or two at a peculiar movement of Kyp’s toned body, or at a particular pouty expression on that hard-planed face, couldn’t be explained any other way. Luke smiled inwardly at that revelation. Another milestone passed; finally, he admitted to himself that there was a place for more than one love in his life.

“So,” the object of his musings interrupted him. “Just how much exactly did you learn on Zeltros?”

In one smooth move Luke pushed away the low table that was between them and got up, flowing fluidly from a relaxed sprawl to a standing position. He made one step forward, and stood right before Kyp, with his legs splayed and his slightly tensed hands hanging by his sides. He knew what kind of a picture he must present, covered only in thin black pants, with his hips tilted a bit, just so, and he was glad to see Kyp’s mouth opening slightly and his eyes starting to darken, this time from obvious lust.

“Want to find out?” he asked with just a hint of a challenge.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For this chapter I'm issuing a warning, and please, take it seriously. Description of murder, non-con, sexual abuse of a minor, and other assorted nastiness that can be expected to happen in a harsh prison thrown into a disarray. Nothing particularly graphic, but enough to impress, I've been told.
> 
>  
> 
> \----------------------------------------------------------------------

The silky mass of curly hair rested on his hip, moving and tickling with every movement of the head bent over his cock. Full, reddened lips, swollen from kisses, engulfed him so completely, so tirelessly, in a warm heaven of pliant mouth that invited him in without shame, without reservation. They were letting him out only to tease him to a state of helpless, but pleasant frustration with the licks of a pink tongue that was just as clever in the matters of pleasure as it was in verbal battles. In the darkened interior of the cabin, in the purple-violet, ethereal dimness, he was drowning in mindless bliss, his body no more than a medium for a true artist of the art of sex that his bedmate was, with his conscious mind all but shuttered. He was unable to resist this call toward rapture, this steady, expertly directed climb to the peak, this diligent attention, intended to liquefy all the bones in his body...

Almost unable.

Almost.

Something, some dissonant note at the back of his mind was refusing to be silenced. Luke started to feel it as early as at the second day after he seduced Kyp, to be completely honest with himself, into renewing the sexual part of their relationship. He still didn’t regret it, not at all, but the nagging feeling of wrongness persisted, and now the buzz of it was becoming so relentless that Luke was unable to ignore it any more, no matter how much his body screamed at him to do exactly that.

“Kyp,” he panted, gathering his resolve. “Stop.”

Of course, his command was ignored. His partner, with typical single-mindedness, wasn’t going to let anything stop him – not even Luke himself. 

Groaning, Luke took a handful of hair and pulled Kyp’s head off his groin forcibly. That, at last, got him some attention. The dark eyes snapped open, unfocused and hazed with lust, but gaining coherence rapidly. “What?” Kyp asked, offended, licking his puffy, glistening lips. “You don’t like what I’m doing?”

“Don’t be silly,” Luke answered seriously. A stray air current hit his wet, exposed cock, making him cringe, but, thankfully, getting the edge off his need. “You know I love it. But, Kyp... what’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” his lover answered quickly. Too quickly. “I don’t know what you mean. What the kriff’s got into you?”

Luke reached forward from his reclining position, and tugged Kyp up by armpits, settling the other man’s body over his own. That put them eye-to-eye, and Luke used this advantage to look closely into Kyp’s green irises, looking for a reaction, demanding an answer. “I might not be as empathic as you are, but I can sense things. There is frustration in you, and fear, and longing for something – something you’re afraid to get, probably? I’m not going to continue to ignore all that just because you know how to shut my brain down.”

Not entirely unexpectedly, Kyp was unable to hold his gaze. “Frustration? Of course I’m vapin’ frustrated – I hadn’t gotten any in more than six months; what do you expect?” he answered, rolling his eyes and wiggling a bit, undoubtedly trying to find a comfortable place for his aching erection alongside Luke’s.

Luke smirked, refusing to be distracted. “There is one good thing about sexual frustration: it goes away quickly when satisfied. This is the third day that we’re spending almost entirely in bed, and the first one alone would have, I bet, burned out any abstinence frustration you’ve had. But it’s not getting better, isn’t it? It’s getting worse, and you’re getting desperate. You’re starting to behave like a man who needs something badly, but, unable to find it, tries to find substitutes, grasping at this and that, finding it not sufficient, and immediately going after the next thing. I don’t want to add to your disappointment. So, once again, what is it, love?”

“Noth... what did you say?!”

“Did someone pass a law while I wasn’t looking that a man can’t have more than one love in his life?” 

“Luke,” Kyp said in a strained voice, ducking his head. “Stop it. Stop fucking around with my head... and with my heart, which is worse.”

He shook his head. “The only fucking I’d like to do here is the one you’re not allowing me to do. Each time I’ve tried to pleasure you in the last days, each time I tried to make love to you, you denied me, and seized the initiative. I wouldn’t have minded, if it was what you needed... but it’s not, is it, Kyp? What are you so afraid of?” He cupped Kyp’s face with his hands, and turned it up, not surprised to see the tightly closed eyes. “Of being loved?”

“Can you just leave it alone?”

“Do you think I should?”

“You really know how to kill the mood, don’t you?” Kyp asked sullenly.

Luke flipped him on his back, reversing their positions. Then he seized his partner’s wrists, bringing both of them on the same level with Kyp’s head and fixing them there with his hands. “It depends,” he whispered into Kyp’s neck, feeling him shiver involuntary at the feeling of warm breath on his skin. “If it’s the mood where you’re trying to wrap yourself around my cock, so you won’t have to look me in the eyes, yes, I’m all too happy to kill it.” He raised his head, looking straight into Kyp’s narrowed eyes. “I don’t want to be the object of your artistry, however pleasurable it is. All I want is to love you... but that’s the one thing you’re not allowing me to do.”

“Luke...”

“What is so scary in that?” he asked, kissing and nipping the very same spot that had got him such a satisfying reaction when Kyp was asleep, almost two weeks ago. This time, though, Kyp was conscious, and that made a hell of a difference. Instead of enthusiastically allowing Luke better access, Kyp’s body became rigid, trembling slightly. 

“Don’t...”

“Why? Tell me why, and I’ll quit...for now,” Luke answered, sliding his lips down Kyp’s neck, alongside the tendon, still kissing, still nipping. “What’s so scary in love?”

“Not love, Luke, never love. Just... memories.”

Luke raised his head and looked at Kyp’s miserable face. “Kessel?”

“Yes.”

He released Kyp’s wrists immediately, and rolled away, but, to his surprise, Kyp didn’t move. He continued to lie in the same exact pose. “Force knows,” Luke said with feeling, “I hate even the idea that I might remind you of something that’s so painful. Should I move back to the sofa?”

“Shavit!” Kyp exploded suddenly, grabbing his hand. “No, Luke, no! Kriff! Why now? I haven’t thought about all that crap in years... why in nine Corellian hells is it all coming back to me now?”

“Probably there is a reason for that,” Luke answered, stroking Kyp’s cheekbone with his thumb. In the approaching darkness he was starting to have trouble seeing Kyp’s face. “Remember, back then, on Yavin 4, I asked you who appointed you to be my psychologist?”

“Yes, and I said that the Force did, because otherwise out of all places where you could have headed, you wouldn’t have ended up at my campfire.”

“More or less. If your memories are starting to bother you now, probably it’s because I’m here... and for once, we have all the time we need to deal with that.”

“Just good old plain talking?”

“And whatever else you might require. It’s worked so far, don’t you think?”

Kyp didn’t answer for a long time, or so it seemed, but then he heard a sigh. “Luke?”

“Yes, love.”

“Hold me, please.”

“Gladly.”

***

“You know, people always tell me that I’m lucky. I can’t even count how many times I heard the words ‘Durron’s luck’ spoken as something enviable. I never could understand that – I mean, just look at my life! I doubt very much that anyone would have liked to repeat my road. No matter. I think I finally figured out what this famous Durron’s luck is all about. It means getting the best out of the worst possible options.”

They were lying side by side in complete darkness – Kyp insisted on it, stating flatly that he didn’t want to see Luke’s reactions to anything he was going to tell. Which was probably a wise decision; Luke was able to shield any untoward emotions, or at least he hoped so, but he wasn’t nearly as sure about his facial expressions. 

“My parents were some of the first killed during the revolt. They annoyed everyone with their moralization badly enough to make it a priority. I think I should be thankful for the fact that someone hit me over the head _before_ that happened, cue ‘Durron’s luck’. At least I guess that was what happened – I think it was a concussion, since my memories around that moment are lost. I came back as the only living being in a room full of corpses, and I actually don’t remember much besides having a blinding headache and a lot of dizziness. I don’t even think I looked at my parents’ bodies, I just fled. I was scared to death.”

Luke squeezed his hand, in a hope to convey his support – although, he thought with terrible helplessness, support didn’t really mean much in a case like that. How awfully naïve he had been eighteen years before, when he expected Kyp to heal all his wounds in a month or two and behave like... not even a normal teenager, but a normal adult. The boy needed a long rehab or at least a lot of hypnotherapy, and all he had gotten was a month of something close to family life from Han, and a lot of lectures about emotional control from him. What kind of idiocy had that been?

Kyp seemed not to notice his bitter thoughts. “There my luck came to help me again: I found a place to hide in one of the kitchens, a cabinet that was big enough to hold me, but not any adult, so it got omitted during the usual searches. I don’t know how long I was hiding there; my memories about that period are very unclear. I remember getting out a couple of times to drink and search for some scraps of food, but that’s about all. Of course, it couldn’t last forever. I was discovered and kicked back to the prisoners’ quarters. 

“But I was a smart kid. I understood very quickly that the only way to survive for me was to pretend I’m not there. It’s funny, in retrospect, how much I was relying on the Force even when I didn’t even know what it was. I took for granted that if I wished for someone not to see me badly enough, he wouldn’t. It worked for so long – relatively – that I got careless. I stopped hiding – I mean, physically. As you very well know, it’s one thing to divert attention when you’re skulking in a dark corner, and quite another to do that in plain sight, when more than one person can see you, but I didn’t know that then. I got cocky, and I paid for that.

“By then, the struggle for the new leadership amongst the prisoners was almost over – ‘leadership’ being a very perverse term here. Let’s just say that the number of local bullies got worn down to two, but those two were real nasties. Both were pretty strong-minded, as I understand now, and I don’t think that my little tricks would have worked on them in the best of circumstances, which being caught in the process of stealing food from one of them definitely wasn’t. Aside from getting beaten to the point where my head was spinning so badly I couldn’t have attempted anything anyway... well, people in prisons have some pretty cruel ideas about what to do with the ones who are stealing from their fellow inmates. The fact that I was a child meant nothing to him, only added to the allure. 

“Cue Durron’s Luck again. You know what, let’s shorten it to DL – I have a feeling that it’s going to figure a lot. The second local bully decided that it was time to settle once and for all who was in command there and, in true animalistic fashion, they began to squabble about who was going to have the honor of raping me first. The squabble became a fight, and that attracted guards, who threw us in the punishment cells with a promise of a good whipping for all of us – them for fighting, me for stealing. By that point I thought I was dead for sure. There was no way I would have been able to survive either a gang rape or the electric whip.”

By that point in Kyp’s narrative, Luke was barely able to lie still. The urge to jump from the bed and hit something, anything, just to let out the helpless anger that was boiling in him, was almost overwhelming. “Kyp,” he squeezed out.

“Yes?”

“Give me a minute, please.”

“Need to calm down?”

“Force, yes.”

“Me too.”

“Kyp?”

“What?”

“Let me...”

“Yes.”

Luke reached for him blindly, hugging his lover for what it was worth, as if getting closer than close, dissolving into each other, could have helped both of them. In a minute, their breathing became synchronized, the same deep inhalations and slow exhalations that were designed to quell the storm of emotions. 

“I never told anyone about that,” Kyp whispered in Luke’s ear finally. “Strange... I think you were right, talking helps. It’s like all that crap boiled its way to the surface again, and I feel like it’s going to make me explode... but as soon as I’m telling about it, it gets better, less painful, more distant. I don’t understand why.”

“Does it matter? It helps; that’s what’s important.” Unable to contain himself, Luke turned his head and planted a gentle kiss on Kyp’s temple, a kiss born not of passion, but of aching desire to express, however inadequate it might be, how much he loved and cherished this diamond soul. 

Kyp, however, seemed to understand, for he squeezed Luke in his own embrace, and then let go. “Are you all right now?” he said.

“I should be asking you that.”

“It’s not a contest, Luke.”

“I know. I’m all right. Whenever you want to continue.”

“I think I’m good to go. I forgot to mention one thing – shortly before that Doole, probably because he had finally understood that negotiating spice deals and managing the mines are two different things, hired a man to oversee the whole prison complex. The guards just called him Master S; I found out much later that his name was Simge. DL again – the man had a taste for young boys, and as soon as he heard about what happened, he ordered me to be delivered to his quarters to check me out.”

“You call that luck?”

“Compared to other choices of course it was, Luke. A wash, a clean bed, nutritious food – everything I could only dream about for two years, and all I had to do was to be silent and obedient, and be a good fuck-toy. Nothing else. If I did that I got everything that was needed to keep me alive and healthy. If I didn’t – and I did balk from time to time; ‘silent’ I could do, ‘obedient’ was much harder – he beat me, but although a whipping with a leather strip is not exactly pleasant, at least I wasn’t likely to get a serious injury from it. He also took care not to do me any harm, and if he thought he did cause some, he left my ass in peace until everything healed. He understood very well that finding a replacement for me would cause him more trouble than just being a decent slave-owner.

“The hardest thing for me in this arrangement wasn’t even the sex. It was unpleasant; it was painful most of the time, but I knew that if I refused, the only thing it was going to earn me was getting kicked back down to the mines, where I would be used in the same manner, but without any care for my well-being, and without any benefits, like food and a regular shower. I was practical enough even then to accept that. 

"No, the thing I had most trouble with, and that got me whipped most of the time, was that he demanded absolute passivity from me. He really treated me as a very expensive fuck toy; it’s not a figure of speech, believe me. If he told me to sit here or lie there, I didn’t have the right even to move until he would tell me I can. If I wanted to eat, I could eat only when he decided so, and most of the time he fed me himself. Same in the shower – he always washed me, and did all the other things – he was crazy about cleanliness and hygiene. But, Luke, it was driving me crazy! He played with me like I was a doll, but he didn’t see me at all – it was all so impersonal!”

Luke groaned quietly. He finally understood what being weak and dependent for self-care might have meant for Kyp.

“Oh, come on! Get over it; what you were doing for me wasn’t the same. Yes, I got some flashbacks from time to time, but it was you, and it wasn’t impersonal.”

“Still...”

“Get over it!”

Luke smiled into the darkness. “You and Zeth are really very much alike.”

“Oh.”

“Exactly.”

“Oh well. We’re both right, too, you know?”

“Without doubt,” Luke said, still with a smile in his voice.

“Smartarse. Whatever. It went on for some time... at least a couple of months, probably more. But he made one crucial mistake: he forgot to get Doole’s permission to keep me as his personal slave. He probably thought it was within his purview, who knows. But of course, someone ratted him out. There was a big scandal. Doole wanted me back into the mines, he was short on workers as is. Simge wanted me to stay in his bed, of course. They reached a compromise after all – four days a week I worked in the mines, and one was set aside for Simge to work on me. In addition, he could take me out another three days in a month, whenever he felt like it. 

“So I was back in the mines. But a lot had changed by then – I was stronger and healthier. And Simge made it abundantly clear that I was off-limits. They called me a little whore at every other step, but no one dared to touch me. In fact, he saved my life, or at least my health – I barely made it even being fed every fifth day; without it, I’d have most probably starved to death.”

“He used you.”

“Yes, but at least he had enough... I don’t know, brains, or some vestiges of decency to give me something in return. He could have just taken me without any reservations, and in that case I wouldn’t have lasted more than a couple of months. I saw what happened to the guy they choose as a common whore instead of me.”

“He died?”

“Horribly, Luke, horribly. Blood loss, infection... believe me, you don’t want to know. I looked at him and I could feel his torment, and how they fucked the life out of him day by day, and I couldn’t do anything to help him, anything! In fact, I was glad it wasn’t me... and I was afraid that when he was dead, they might get bold enough to try for me again. One day we were working with lights, for a change – it was an old mine, with no spice left, and we were building a transit station inside. They stood under a big stone, two of them and one of their cronies. The stone was stable, had been for years, but I imagined it suddenly falling down and killing them all.”

“And it did.”

“Yes.”

_“Good.”_

“Yes, it was good. It didn’t help the poor sod, he died anyway, just a couple days after that, but the others took it as a sort of divine retribution, and came to certain conclusions. No one was raped anymore; the accepted story was that the spirits that lived in the mines took badly to that sort of behavior. Even guards believed in that. But of course, my own patron was way too educated to believe in such nonsense. For me, everything continued the same way.

“By that time I’d gotten used to the arrangement, more or less. One or two days out of five weren’t that bad – I needed rest. And the man still had to work, which meant that for some time I got his apartment all to myself. He didn’t mind, as long as at the time of his return everything, including me, was in exactly the same place he’d left it. I still hadn’t forgotten completely how to read back then, and as soon as I got my hands on his library, it came back quickly. I read everything that came to my hands, mostly classic literature, he had a thing for that. I still wonder how he ended up as a manager for a thug like Doole. He was ruthless enough, but a little too sophisticated for such work.”

“So that’s where your vocabulary came from. I did wonder about that.”

“Uh-huh. So you see, by that time I wasn’t minding my circumstances at all. His remoteness still bugged me, but it was getting better, slowly, but surely. I guess he never had anything but short-term arrangements of whatever nature before me, and just treated me at first the same way he would have treated a whore that he’d bought for a night, but it proved to be too much of a bother in the long run, or he just lost the taste for that sort of play. He still demanded unquestionable obedience from me, but started to drop some small things, to give me some slack. I could at least change a position without him telling me so. Even that felt like a victory.”

“No wonder you don’t take well to authority figures.”

“Well, that depends on the kind of authority, really.” Kyp was silent for a couple of moments, then asked, seemingly without any relation to the previous talk: “Remember, you asked me a question?”

“Which one?”

“About my attitude toward sex.”

“Oh. So?”

“Put on the big bold letters DL again. I might have ended up like many other people in my situation, totally asexual, or badly warped, if not for the fact that I, apparently, have an overactive sex drive by nature. All I needed was a trigger to channel it. 

“I don’t know how it happened that I got my first orgasm. Everything, it seemed, had been against letting me find any pleasure in sex at all, but it happened nonetheless. Luke, I can’t even say it was a revelation. It was a total and complete blowout. Just imagine -- the only bodily pleasure available to me during all those years was a shower. Actually, I think you just might understand. You’ve been pretty much in the same situation, that night on Yavin 4... less acute, of course, but basically the same.”

“I think I know where you’re heading.”

“If the words ‘instant addiction’ appeared in your mind, you’re on the right track. I was willing to do absolutely anything to feel that again. I knew, of course, that sex can be pleasurable, or else why people were doing that? Fortunately, prison romances exist not only in myths, and there were a couple around that put a thought in my head that sex and pain are not always the same. All I needed to grasp the concept fully was a personal experience. As soon as I got it, everything clicked into place. The very idea that something I was forcing myself to endure for the sake of survival could be pleasurable... well, it’s a pity we don’t have a galactic list of records. I might have qualified as the youngest sex addict in the galaxy, in addition to the definite nomination for the most spectacular teenage rebellion.”

“How old were you ?”

“I have no idea, truth to be told. No more than thirteen for sure. I wasn’t even old enough to come – my first orgasm was a dry one. But it didn’t matter... nothing mattered, really. I was hooked in a matter of days.

“My sudden enthusiasm took Simge completely by surprise. The first time I dared to open my mouth and beg him to fuck me, he was so dumbfounded that he beat me again, out of pure confusion, I bet. But then it occurred to him that instead of our previous power game – he strict owner, me obedient slave, which he was frankly tired of already – he could employ a new one, which might be much more exciting. The man could think on his feet, I give him that. 

“Since then our relationship became one endless power struggle. I was determined to get my pleasure, he was equally determined to make me sweat for it. It was very educational. I started to learn rapidly. Before, it was enough just to lie quietly and take it, now, I had to learn how to seduce, to make him forget his control and reservations. My empathy helped a lot, of course, but he was by no means an easy man to read or to influence, and that made my task really challenging. And you know, I’m always willing to take a challenge.

“For the first time, I started to really look forward to the days I was spending with Simge. Everything changed. Aside from everything else, this new turn in our relationship meant that he started to allow me to talk – I had to be able to beg him to fuck me, after all. One thing led to another, and he discovered that I could be a more interesting conversationalist than Doole and his thugs. After that he started to feed me every book he could find, out of pure interest, just to see how quickly I could read it and what I could comprehend. He put time restrictions on it, and asked me afterwards quite strictly what it was about and what I thought it meant... it was not unlike school lessons, come to think about it. It was all a part of the game, of course, just another opportunity to reward me or deny me, but does it really matter in the long run? ‘What we think, or what we know, or what we believe is, in the end, of little consequence. The only consequence is what we do’. The fact is, he gave me the education I’d have never had otherwise.”

“Is that a quote?” Luke interrupted him. “Where from?”

“’Being and Doing, or the Ultimate Contrariety’ by Kerenza Murrin.”

Luke sighed. “Classic philosophy is really something I never had time for. Probably I should start reading it.”

Kyp laughed quietly. “Most of it is trash, believe me. Murrin being one of the few exceptions.”

“Because she was able to nicely summarize your lifelong credo?”

“Probably, but where do you think I got it from? It’s hard to determine what was first in this case. I was too young when I started to read all that, and even now I have trouble sorting out what I acquired through the literature, and what was a product of my own thought process. Let’s return to my story. I have to say, out of all that happened between Deyer and my escape with Han, those were the best years. I was engaged, I was challenged, I learned fast, and from time to time, when I managed to make him forget his control, or when he decided to reward me, it was very pleasurable. And then...”

“And then what?” Luke prodded gently after a prolonged silence.

“And then nothing,” Kyp said listlessly. “One week I just wasn’t called to his quarters. And then the next, and the next. Finally, I learned from some of the guards that he quit his work for Doole and left Kessel.”

“Just like that?!”

“Just like that. Looking back, I suppose, I ought to have seen the warning signs. I was starting to have trouble arousing him. I was maturing, and starting to get too old for his tastes. He had even commented on that a couple of times in my presence, said what a pity it was that he couldn’t stop my physical aging, but I was too preoccupied to pay attention – not that it would have changed anything. Doole was starting to get on his nerves, too; their squabbles weren’t a secret for anyone. I don’t know what I expected, really. I just wasn’t thinking about the future, living from one week to another, never looking forward to more than that.

“To say that it really messed me up would be to say nothing, Luke. For years, this man was practically the sole focus of my existence. I never had any friends amongst the prisoners, except for Vima, but she was long gone by then. Some of them were envying me, some of them were despising me, but no one was interested in befriending me. Suddenly, I was all alone, with no additional food or regular washes I’d gotten so used to, without literature to satisfy my mind, and that was something that had become a very important thing to me by that time... but what was worse, I was left without sex. It was approximately a year before I escaped, so I was about fifteen, with all the hormones in full swing and no satisfaction anywhere in sight.

“I tried masturbation, of course, but it wasn’t enough – I guess I got too used to anal stimulation. It barely took the edge off, and, in desperation, I turned to the one thing I knew would help. I started to look for someone who would fuck me, and, of course, feed me. None of the inmates were up to that by then – they were too drained, and too unwilling to part with their precious food, and I turned to the guards. I did learn how to seduce quite well, not that it required a lot of effort. In a matter of months I went through easily all of the personnel that I had any access to, and some of those I didn’t. The word started to spread, and some of those who worked in different parts of the prison started to come for a nice and easy fuck. I tried at least to receive something in return, but, unfortunately, they understood pretty soon that all it took was to wait until I get desperate enough for release. Some of them still fed me, though, either out of pity, or for the same reason Simge did. It’s not fun to fuck a walking skeleton, after all. 

“I never stopped to think about what I was doing. I was living in a haze, going from satisfying one need to satisfying another, with exhausting work in between. It was a miracle that I didn’t catch any infection at the time – DL again, no doubt, because those guys weren’t exactly careful with me. Nothing mattered anymore except for feeding the hunger, and the one for food was starting to matter less and less. Like a true addict, I required more and more and more to satisfy this insane craving. Soon one man at a time became not enough, and I started to take two, three ‘clients’ together, not even minding what it did to my body. Sometimes I was sore for days afterwards, but I still came back to offer myself again. Not an attractive picture, is it?”

Luke didn’t answer this question. It wasn’t, and Kyp knew that quite well, judging by the disgust in his voice. “How did you stop?” Luke asked hoarsely.

He felt Kyp shrugging his shoulders. “I overheard a conversation between two of the guards who were my frequent customers. One of them was usually kind to me... brought me food regularly, and took at least minimal care. The other – well, let’s just say that I, apparently, had quite a masochistic streak in me. He beat me, he never fed me, he didn’t care if he made me bleed, but, amazingly, I got an orgasm each time I was with him, and, therefore, I never told him no... but sometimes being barely able to walk wasn’t just a cliché phrase after the couplings with him. 

“Anyway... they were on friendly terms, strangely enough. ‘Why are you feeding him?’ the second one asked the first. ‘He’ll bend for you anyway. He’ll do anything to have a nice fat cock up his ass. All you need to do is to show it to him.’

‘He’s going to starve to death if someone won’t feed him’, said the first one.

‘He’s going to die anyway, and soon. This boy is a mindless whore. Simge trained him well – there is nothing in that pretty head except the craving for a fuck. You know as well as I do that people like him don’t live long. No brains, no sanity, no pride – who the hell cares if he lives or not? He’s just a hole to be fucked. Use him while you can.’”

Luke didn’t like the lifelessness in Kyp’s voice. Even less than that did he like the fact that Kyp was inching away from him; he didn’t know if the younger man did it consciously, but there was a good fifteen centimeters between them now. It felt like a chasm.

“For some reason, that jolted my hormonally-addled brain back into working condition. Sometimes you need the truth to be presented to you in the most uncompromising and cruel manner for it to really penetrate. I suddenly realized what had become of me. Sure, I had been called a whore for most of my time on Kessel, but I never let it get to me – I knew I hadn’t had a choice back then. But now, oh, now it was very much my choice. No one was forcing me to offer myself anymore, and for the first time I felt like I had this damning word tattooed all over my body, for anyone to see, and it was burning my skin. 

“And the other things he said about me were even more disturbing. No brains – me? No pride – me? Nothing more than a hole to fuck – me? I thought I’d die from shame, and it’s not a figure of speech, believe me. I felt all my insides tying up in a knot. For a couple of days I was either retching my guts out or earning a blinding headache trying to understand how could I have forgotten everything that was _me_ so completely, but I was unable to comprehend that. Still can’t. 

“I decided to quit, of course, to quit no matter what. And I did, but, Luke, I thought I’d die for sure, and for the first time in my life I thought it might be a good thing. I won’t bother you with details – believe me, it wasn’t pretty. It was so not pretty that in addition to despising me, my fellow inmates started to fear me – I was ready to snap off and rocket into hysterics or violence, or both, at the smallest provocation. The punishment cell became almost as familiar to me as my own bunk. Whippings weren’t fun, either, but, perversely, they helped me – pain cleared my mind, helped me focus, and for some time afterwards I felt almost normal. 

“Most of my former customers were less than happy with me. They still refrained from forcing me directly, but there are a lot of ways a guard can make a prisoner’s life miserable, and they used all of them. I don’t think I would have endured if not for that one guy – the one who had been feeding me before. He was still bringing me food. The first time he did that, I refused. I said I can’t do that anymore. He said he brought it for free. I couldn’t believe my ears, but he just left those two ration bars on my bunk and left. When he did that for the second and third time I finally believed him, and it was another revelation. Someone gave something to me without asking anything in return? Impossible. I asked him why. He just shook his head and said he knew I had something in me beside a pretty ass. ‘Hold on,’ he said. ‘It gets better – it just seems like it never will.’ I often wondered afterwards if he wasn’t a former addict himself. There was a strange camaraderie in the way he said that. I think there were at least a couple of times I toed that damned line again, being on the brink of just giving up, and the only thing that stopped me was the fear that I’d disappoint him – the only being who believed in me.”

“Do you know what happened to him?” 

“No. It’s one of my ever-present nightmares, Luke, that I might meet one of them again. The galaxy is an awfully small place sometimes, and I can’t stop wondering what’d happen if one of those who knew me in the most carnal sense of the word back then realizes that their little whore from Kessel and the Jedi Master Kyp Durron, the member of High Council, are the same person!”

Luke understood totally. His own skin was crawling at the very idea that some old ‘pal’ from Tatooine could show up and call him Wormie for anyone to hear, and it was just a childhood nickname, however distasteful. “Let’s hope not,” he said. “I don’t think any of them, if they are still alive, which I doubt very much after everything that happened, would risk angering you. You have quite a reputation for destroying things that made you angry. For once, I’m glad you do.”

“And still...”

“If it happens, we’ll deal with it together. Kyp, listen to me. Stop trying to crawl out of the bed. You don’t have to try to get from me before I leave, because I won’t do that. Do you hear me? I won’t do that. I’m not disgusted. You idiot, have you been carrying this burden for all those years without telling anybody?”

“Well... yes. Mostly. A couple of my friends know some of it, but not all.”

“Force...” Luke sighed. “And you still can feel, still can love... it’s nothing short of amazing.”

“I didn’t have an alternative. It was either to learn how to love or die. I just couldn’t live with that emptiness inside. I had to find something else to live for. And I think I always knew, I never forgot completely. Luke, I really don’t know what came over me back then! I can’t understand it!” And Kyp edged away some more.

Luke unerringly found Kyp’s hand in the darkness and pulled him back. “Stop that. I know you don’t want to get away from me – you just think that I do. Come here.” He gathered the tense body in his arms and felt it relax gradually, almost reluctantly. “You might not understand what was happening with you, but I think I know. I never had been interested in psychology, but there is one bit I did some research into. When Jacen returned from captivity, I was puzzled about his relationship with Vergere, who betrayed him and tortured him. And still, Jacen seemed to be strongly attached to her, dependent, even. It was something I didn’t understand, and Mara pointed out to me that it’s actually not uncommon for a prisoner to become attached to his master. You’re not unique in this respect...”

“I wasn’t attached to Simge and the others!”

“That’s why you repeatedly used the term ‘relationship’ when you described all the abuse he dished to you? That’s why you spent years on trying to make him see you as a person, not as a sex toy? Don’t lie to yourself, Kyp, because without realizing it, you will spend the rest of your life thinking that all that crap was your fault. You couldn’t _not_ to be attached to him, the man was the only one who gave you at least some care and attention. And then, after this relationship – for it was one – became really personal, after you became fully involved in it, did everything you could to please him, he left you. Of course it messed your head up, that was inevitable. There is nothing in that to be ashamed about. Sex was practically all you knew back then. No wonder that in order to process you turned to sex.”

“What are you saying?” Kyp asked, with a distinct, albeit hesitant, surge of hope.

“You’re afraid of letting a man make love to you because you think it might wake up your ‘addiction’? Yes or no, Kyp?”

A long pause, then: “Yes. Anything but that, Luke, anything.”

“It’s not something that’s innate for you, so you can stop worrying.”

“How do you know?”

“I know. No, I know and I _feel_ that.” Luke groaned in frustration. “I can’t explain. I’m not a psychologist. But tell me, which part do you fear – being the object of attention, instead of being the one in charge, or being with a man?”

“Both,” Kyp said slowly. “Neither one in itself – I can be passive with a woman... and I can have sex with a man, as you undoubtedly noticed by now.”

“So you think you’re addicted to only one special form of sex. And yet, you say that back then you did it all because you were addicted to pleasure, to orgasms, to put it blandly. But if it were so, you would have become just as addicted to other forms of sex as well. An orgasm is an orgasm – if you’re addicted to it, you’ll be addicted to it no matter what the means for getting there. Do you see that it doesn’t add up?” Kyp was silent. “Think about it.”

“Why are you doing this, Luke?” Kyp asked suddenly. “Why is that so important to you? Do you really want to fuck me that badly?”

A wave of hot anger rolled over Luke, but he willed it away, feeding it to the calmness of their surroundings bit by bit. It wasn’t Kyp’s fault, this insecurity; he should put the blame where it belonged – on the people who had done their utmost to convince a defenseless child that he had no other value besides being a sex object. 

“I don’t want to fuck you,” he answered at last. “I want to love you. I want to make love to you the way I didn’t know how thirteen years ago, and the way you’re not allowing me now. I need it. And I think that you need it as well, that’s why everything we have been doing so far was unable to satisfy you. This might be our last chance – we both know that this sojourn from the reality of our lives won’t last. We already missed one opportunity to have something real and profound between us, and I don’t want your fears to stay in our way for the second time. Not because of fear, Kyp – anything but that,” he said forcefully, deliberately echoing Kyp’s earlier words.

“You’re just about the only man I ever considered letting do that,” Kyp said slowly, the black pools of his eyes unreadable in the darkness. “Even back then... if you asked, I wouldn’t have said no. It scared me. Not then, but afterwards.”

“Because you wanted it too much?”

“Yes...”

“It’s not the same.”

“I know. But it’s still scary. I learned to be wary of things I want too much.”

Luke leaned forward and kissed him, not on the lips, but on the brow, then traced the line of one of the sharp black eyebrows with his lips. “The question isn’t ‘do you want it or not’,” he said quietly. “It’s ‘do you need it or not?’ And fear, as you very well know, is not a good advisor.”


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Graphic oral male/male sex, people. Scroll over, if that's not your cup of tea. 
> 
> \------------------------------------------------------------------

In a battle between arousal and hilarity, Luke discovered, the winner was relief.

“That’s cheating!” he yelled to Kyp, who swayed provocatively some three or four meters from him. The ignited lightsaber in his right hand seemed to be less of a weapon and more of a fancy accessory for the show the black-haired Jedi was putting on. The gyrating movements of the lean hips, covered (barely!) with the same sheer white pants – and this time it was extremely obvious what exactly was keeping them in place – were as effective a distraction as anything Luke ever saw in his life, but didn’t impede Kyp’s fighting abilities at the slightest. The Ataru style incorporated a lot of dance and gymnastics elements; adding some more wasn’t a stretch at all.

“Of-kriffin’-course,” Kyp answered readily. “How am I expected to get five rounds out of six on you otherwise?” He twirled the lightsaber in his hand, then started to move sideways in gliding dance steps, circling Luke and making him turn toward the bright disc of the Mon Cal’s sun. “It’s your fault that you didn’t think of packing additional lightsabers.” With that, he lunged forward.

Luke blocked the attack effortlessly, locking their lightsabers in a clinch above their heads. That proved to be a tactical mistake, since Kyp used the opportunity to rub his groin against Luke’s, long enough to make the older man forget for a moment what exactly they were doing there. The full, smiling lips and the white streak of teeth beckoned; for a moment, Luke saw a tip of the pink tongue sticking out between them. He reflexively swayed forward, aiming for a kiss... and found himself face down on the packed, wet sand in the very next moment.

“That’s four,” Kyp wasn’t even trying to contain the laughter in his voice. “One to go. You really should work on this serenity and emotional control thing.”

Luke used the fact that his face was turned away from Kyp and laughed, quietly. Right now he had no intention of doing what Kyp suggested – he enjoyed the game too much. After all the angst of the previous night, he was very happy to see Kyp in such a playful and provocative mood. Of course he could beat Kyp without difficulty, for the younger man was still not completely over the weakness that his illness left behind, but where would have been the point in that?

However, he wasn’t going to surrender quite that easily. Two could play that game. He rolled on his back, but didn’t get up, continuing to lie on the sand with hands and legs spread out, one of them bent at the knee and slightly splayed. And he knew his pants didn’t cover much, either.

“I’m starting to think serenity is overrated,” he said lazily. “Wouldn’t you agree?”

“Definitely,” Kyp answered cheerfully from the safe distance of a couple meters, eyeing Luke’s supine body with suspicion. 

The older man smiled and stretched, straining the muscles of his hands and shoulders, and turning his head to the side to make his neck tendon stand out prominently. Kyp had his little weaknesses, too, and Luke knew them quite well by now. Just as he expected, the younger man’s eyes immediately assumed that familiar, slightly criss-crossed look, and Luke cheered inwardly. 

A surge of warm, salty water from the sea hit Kyp in the back, throwing him head-first right into Luke’s waiting arms. “That’s cheating!” he exclaimed indignantly, dripping, laughing, and sputtering.

“Of-kriffin’-course it is, love,” Luke answered, kissing the salty warm lips briefly. “Of-kriffin’-course,” he repeated, resuming the kiss, deepening it and taking the full possession of this contrary mouth. 

And then something new happened. Instead of struggling for dominance, Kyp just relaxed into the kiss, the way he never had before. Still far from being passive, he, nevertheless, surrendered the control, not trying to direct the exchange according to his wishes. A prickling, sizzling joy rose in Luke, like the air bubbles in a glass of fizz-pop. At last, it seemed that Kyp had settled something within himself. 

Luke closed his eyes and dived into the kiss, wrapping his presence around his lover just as tightly as his arms and legs. Instead of being a game of giving and taking, the kiss was becoming a joint affair; each of them did his best to follow other’s lead. Playfulness to playfulness, strength to strength, like to like – what one started, the other ended, and one kiss was becoming many, because neither of them seemed to be able to abandon this fest of mutual appreciation. Kyp didn’t even try to shield, and Luke could sense first his apprehension, then, when whatever he feared didn’t come, surprise, and then the happy abandon with which he discarded his oh-so-habitual, but tiresome control. He was giving himself fully now, without a shadow of doubt, in a complete certainty that whatever Luke might want from him, whatever Luke might do, he would be _safe_...

In that moment Luke loved him more than anyone else he ever loved in his life, even Mara.

The sudden compulsion to express what he was feeling, to make it solid by putting it into words, made him break the kiss and whisper: “I love you, Kyp. Never doubt that.”

The bright green eyes opened and looked at him with just a hint of a sorrow. “I love you too. But...”

“I know. But right now, it’s just you and I. Right now, everything else can wait. I realized something in the last weeks, Kyp, because of you: love is too precious to waste it, even for the sake of another love. So – no regrets for me. You?”

“No... not for me, either. I just can’t stop thinking how much it might complicate everything.”

Luke laughed, ducking his head into the warm heaven of Kyp’s neck. “Now you’re the one who’s worrying about the consequences?”

Kyp smiled. “I’m getting old?”

“I’d call it maturity, but I think you’re picking a wrong time to display it. Complications... would they be worse than what we’d had before, that mistrust, that estrangement?”

“No... you’re right. That was miserable.”

Luke kissed him again, lightly, nipping at full lips. “So there is no ideal, consequence-free solution. Fine. I’m willing to live with the consequences. Are you?”

He felt the lips under his stretching out in a smile. “Always. I was worried for you, not for myself – you have much more at stake here, golden boy.”

Luke rolled them around, so Kyp was at the bottom now, and looked at him seriously. “Do me a favor – worry about yourself, for a change. I’m adult enough to make my own decisions, don’t you think?”

Kyp made a face. “I know. Control issues again, no doubt. Luke, when the kriff did I become such a control freak? I haven’t noticed.”

“You always were, if I remember correctly. But yes, I think you took it too far in recent years.” 

“It becomes too much,” Kyp whispered almost soundlessly. “I know I can’t control everything, but at the same time I can’t stop trying. It wears me down, and sometimes I wonder if it’s worth it... and wouldn’t it be better just to let things run their course? But it’d mean doing nothing, and I just don’t know how to react to things without doing something. How do you do it, Luke?”

“I don’t know. I just do. Probably because I still believe in the general benevolence of the Universe and the people who live in it. And before you say it, yes, I know it’s not always the case, and I know it’s hard for you to ever feel like that, after everything you’ve been through, but you have to learn how to let go. The older you get, the more responsibility you acquire, the harder it becomes to control everything. We’re not super-beings, Kyp. I know, you think my attitude is lackadaisical...”

“In all the wrong places. And you think my attitude is too forceful.”

“Yes. But for both our sakes, we need to find some middle ground.”

“Rub off each other a bit?”

“Or a lot. As much as we can manage.”

Kyp wiggled under him, thrusting his hips forward. “I’m all for rubbing off each other.”

Luke laughed. “Do you always think about sex?”

“Luuuuke!” Kyp whined. “It’s a bit hard to think about anything else in this position! Come on! You really expected me to hold a long philosophical discussion while lying under you like this ?”

Spread out like he was, legs apart and wrists securely seized in Luke’s grasp, the skin of a defined torso powdered with fine white sand, which highlighted its tan and smooth texture, Kyp was, indeed, too much of a temptation for a philosophical dispute. “You’re right,” the older man said, starting a trail of kisses from his lover’s neck down. “Sex first. Then we can use our five minutes of post-orgasmic apathy to talk philosophy.”

“Don’t get me wrong,” Kyp said in a minute, panting slightly. “But the days when I was willing to take a cock up my arse even with a handful of sand... are long gone... I hope.”

Luke couldn’t help himself. He sighed. Even with all his Tatooine sensibilities significantly dulled, Kyp’s blunt manner of discussing sex issues without deigning to use euphemisms was a bit too much. “Who said I was going to fuck you?” he answered just as bluntly.

“Oh?” Kyp was definitely disappointed. “I kind of hoped you would... after everything you said yesterday.”

Luke chuckled. “Not just yet, love. There are a lot of other things I want to do to you... with you. Just please, stop comparing what we’re doing now to your experiences on Kessel. That might take the starch out even of the strongest hard-on.”

“I’m sorry,” Kyp sounded sincerely apologetic. “But I doubt I can help it.”

“Keep yourself open to me, and as soon as you think you’re starting to slip into the past – reach out. I’m not going to allow you to forget who you are, where you are, and who you are with. I promise.” And with that, he resumed kissing, biting, and licking. Unlike those of many other human males, Kyp’s nipples weren’t particularly sensitive, but the outer outlines of his pectorals were, and tracing them with nails from armpits toward the middle made Kyp suck his breath in sharply and arch his back.

“Like that?”

“S-stupid question. Don’t stop.”

 _Stop? Now, that would be really a stupid idea_ , Luke thought hazily, lost in sensations, savoring every touch, smell, and taste of that splendid body, stretched out for him so willingly. So absorbed he was in his quest, so busy with memorizing tastes and smells, and filing Kyp’s breathless responses to what he was doing in his memory, that when his fingers and lips encountered the rough wet material instead of the abdominal muscles and the smooth velvety skin over them, it came as a complete surprise.

“Ooops?” Kyp asked, still breathless, but with a voice full of merriment.

“Indeed,” Luke agreed, looking up into mischievous eyes. “I kind of forgot they were here.”

Kyp clicked his tongue at him, the sound that successfully substituted the expression of merry irony for so many species in the galaxy. 

“No, really. Which is strange, because the way you have been flaunting them at me the whole week...”

“...made you want to tear them off?”

“Naturally.”

“So what’s stopping you now?”

“I kind of grew attached to them.” Luke rocked back on his knees, and extended his hands forward for Kyp. “Get up. You’re going to get your wish. Soft bed and no sand in sensitive places... although it’s a pity. I love how you’re looking against this white sand – it’s the most perfect contrast for your skin that can be imagined.”

“You missed your calling,” Kyp answered wryly, getting up. “Are you sure you don’t want to try writing romantic novels for a living?” But Luke noticed the dark pink tinge on his cheeks, and he doubted very much that the sunlight had anything to do with it.

Luke, still on his knees, tugged him forward. “Come here.”

He grabbed Kyp’s legs just below his buttocks, and, with a sudden animalistic hunger, pressed his face into the bulge of Kyp’s erection, clearly outlined by the wet fabric, inhaling the mixed scent of seawater, sand, and the tingling, earthy smell of Kyp’s arousal. He breathed it in almost convulsively, with nostrils flaring, consumed by sudden desire to take in at least something that was his lover – and retain it, make it a part of himself like the air he breathed, like his own skin.

He heard a sudden catch of breath from above. “Get them off, shavit, or I’ll do it myself!”

Suddenly less than interested in the fate of a garment he claimed to be fond of just a minute ago, Luke moved his hands up, over the taut hips, and stopped, taking a hold on the waist-line on both sides, just above Kyp’s hipbones. One quick movement, and the thin fabric parted both back and front with a satisfying ripping sound, pooling around the tanned legs and leaving both Kyp’s genitals and his buttocks completely open to whatever the older man might want to do to them.

“Don’t move,” was all Luke said, before taking in all of Kyp’s quite considerable erection in one smooth pull. The only answer he got was a surprised wordless shriek from above.

Luke had never knew what a blessing his wide mouth and almost non-existent gag reflex were until Zeltros. That was he first time that he tried to do to another male what had been done to him, and saw and felt his bedmate thrashing around in happy abandon, totally consumed by pleasure that he, Luke, was able to give, just because he had such a fortunate anatomy – and was willing to use it. Since then, giving blow-jobs became one of his favorite things to do in bed, and he had frankly missed it during all the years he had been married to Mara. Now, at last, he could unleash everything at once on Kyp, take everything, give everything, without being concerned that his lover might interrupt him, and take back the initiative. 

His pleasure, Kyp’s pleasure – it was starting to get unclear which was which. He felt the glide of Kyp’s cock in and out of his throat, inhaled his warm, familiar scent, but at the same time, he could feel the pleasure of an aching erection sliding into the sleek, tight, hot channel, the bulging shoulder muscles under his hands, as if they weren’t Kyp’s hands, but his own. The tactile sensation of having two handfuls of firm, heavy flesh in his hands merged with the feeling of having the very same hands squeezing his buttocks, and it was confusing at first, but then Luke managed to separate the feelings, and the stereo effect it created made every sensation somehow fuller, more acute. 

They both were almost on the brink already, but still, something was missing, some finishing touch that would sharpen the pleasure and open the gates. He wanted, he wanted... actually, Kyp wanted, but what did it matter? He knew what was missing. 

He let Kyp out for barely a moment, just enough to wet two of the fingers of his left hand, but even that momentary delay drew quite a vocal protest from his lover. In recompense, Luke allowed Kyp to thrust back with all his might, so eager he was to have this solid column of flesh back in his mouth, and the force of it almost threw him off-balance. Kyp was way too far gone to care, though, and as soon as Luke righted himself, he stopped thinking about that either.

In. All the way in, until the pubic bone hit the lips. Out. So far out that the air flew around the exposed flesh, cooling it and making the return to the wet heat even more delicious. In, again. Out, again. In. Out.

In. The rounded flesh sliding into his mouth, passing through on the way to his throat, sliding so deep that it made breathing impossible, deep enough to feel it almost touching his heart. Out. The gradual loss, not even made more bearable by the fact that he could breathe again. In, again. Out, again. In. Out.

And then Luke slid his left hand up. Up, past Kyp’s balls tightened in orgasmic anticipation, past the sensitive skin of the perineum, straight to the cleft between the buttocks and the small opening inside it. He thrust both fingers in, ruthlessly, without preliminaries, feeling the tight ring of muscle parting willingly for the intrusion, and the sudden, not-quite-painful sensation made Kyp cry out in the same moment as his dick started to jerk in Luke’s mouth, and the muscles around Luke’s fingers began to contract spasmodically. In the last moment before the tide of sensation swept him along, Luke thrust his fingers deeper, found that wonderful nub, so rich with nerve endings, and rubbed it once, twice, letting the sharp, almost painful pleasure that ran over Kyp's body to tug him over the point of no return as well.

The sudden heaviness on his hands and the sensation of Kyp’s cock sliding out of his mouth alerted him just in time to wake up his reflexes, and he managed to catch the falling body with the Force just in time to lay it down gently on the sand. Kyp had blacked out.

The older man looked at his lover, the torn pants still wrapped around his ankles, the half-erect penis still red and wet from Luke’s ministrations, and with Luke’s fingers still buried deep into his ass, and chuckled. “Well,” he said aloud. “I guess that makes us even. By points, at least.”

He withdrew his fingers carefully, making a face. The clean-up part was still something he wasn’t quite comfortable with. To his surprise, his hand was clean. “Cheater,” he chuckled fondly, looking at his lover’s peaceful, relaxed face. Now he knew why Kyp had spent so much time in the refresher this morning. Never the one not to be prepared, that was Kyp. 

Instead of dragging Kyp’s unmoving body into the water for the cleanup, like the younger man had done with him back on Yavin 4, Luke decided to use the remains of the pants for the same purpose. They were beyond repair, anyway. He just hoped that Taira Irsenna wasn’t attached to them quite the same way he was.

That done, he sat there waiting for Kyp to come back to the realm of the living. Once again he marveled how much younger Kyp looked in sleep or unconsciousness, when the habitual hard set of his features, born out of years of hellish life, anger, and disappointment, slacked down in repose. Right now, with the specks of gray hair almost unnoticeable in the wet, sand-peppered curls, with his face peaceful and mouth slightly open, Kyp looked barely twenty-five years old. 

The black eyelashes quivered, and the green eyes opened, narrowing down to long slits immediately in reaction to the bright sunlight. “You’ve got your wish,” Kyp said plaintively. “I’m on the sand. Now what?”

“Nothing, unfortunately. I wish I had a camera. You’re quite a picture.”

Kyp shielded his eyes and looked at him sardonically. “You should talk. You’re looking like an ad for a sex club. ‘I just gave someone the blow-job of his life, and I’m proud of it!’”

Luke licked his lips. “Was it?”

“Was it what? Oh. Stop fishing for compliments. You’ve got your revenge. I haven’t fainted because of sex in... quite a while,” he finished smoothly.

Luke smiled. “How long a while?”

“Long.” In a moment, Kyp conceded. “All right, thirty three years or thereabouts. I can’t answer for sure for my previous incarnations. Happy now?”

“Very,” Luke answered seriously. “Get up, because otherwise I might be tempted to keep you on this precise spot until complete darkness.”

“Right,” Kyp answered with a challenge. “You and the NR Navy.” But he stood up obligingly, extending one of his hands for Luke. When the older man got up, Kyp tugged him close suddenly. “Thanks,” he said, tracing Luke’s swollen, pulsing lips with the tips of his fingers. “You were right – I needed it.”

“Oh. Isn’t philosophy wonderful when properly illustrated?”

***

The familiar disk of Millennium Falcon, so similar to the giant head of some primitive insect, was getting bigger and bigger against the bright background of the Mon Cal sky. Mara shifted from foot to foot, trying to suppress her irritation. Blast Skywalker for doing it to her! Leia had been protective of her brother in the best of circumstances, and she wasn’t going to be happy that he wasn’t here to meet them. And explaining that might take much more diplomatic ability than Mara possessed, not that it wasn’t already drained to a shriveled crisp by three weeks of Council meetings. 

The ship touched the landing pad gently. The engines grew silent. Here it comes, Mara thought resignedly. 

Han and Leia emerged at the top of the boarding ramp together, and stopped for a moment in surprise. Then they began to walk again, much quicker this time. “Mara?” she heard Leia’s surprised voice. “Where is Luke? I thought he was on-planet. And where is Jacen?”

“Well, hello to you too, Leia,” Mara answered with irritation.

That gave her sister-in-law a pause. “I’m sorry, Mara. Thanks for meeting us, but I thought...”

“Hello, Mara,” Han said pointedly, and his eyes narrowed slightly. “Come to think of it, where is Kyp? He should have been here, I left a message for him two days ago.”

Mara took a deep breath. “The answer to the question of where are Luke and Kyp is one and the same. And the reason why Jacen isn’t here is because I knew you’d ask – and because this information is not his business. Let’s go. I’m not going to talk about this in a public place.”

The trip toward the Skywalker apartment was spent in tense silence. Upon arrival, Mara gave them a very short version of events, hoping that it would satisfy her in-laws, but not particularly counting on that. She was right. To her surprise, however, it wasn’t Leia who was most bothered by her tale. It was Han.

“Luke and Kyp alone on some secluded island? And the kid is being sick and space knows what else? I don’t like it,” he announced blankly.

“Han,” Leia said soothingly. “Luke is all right. I can feel it.”

Her husband gave her a sideway glance. “It’s not Luke I’m worried about.” He unclipped his comlink from his belt. “No offence, Mara, but I want to check on them myself.”

“Won’t do any good,” Mara answered wearily. “They are not accepting calls. I haven’t had any contact with Luke during all this time. That was precisely the point of going into seclusion – so no one could bother them with calls and questions about how they are doing.”

Leia turned her worried gaze from her sister-in-law to her husband. “Han, don’t you think it’s a bit excessive? Luke is all right, I told you that, and he surely can take care of Kyp, if Kyp really needs it.”

“The last time I trusted Luke to take care of Kyp when the kid had problems, we ended up with Luke in a coma, stars going nova, and Kyp being on trial with a very real possibility of execution hanging over his head,” Han all but spat out. “Forgive me if I’m not reassured by this record.” He pressed the buttons, but all he got in return was a standard answering message in a mechanical voice. “Cliff,” he whispered.

“I told you,” Mara couldn’t refrain from pointing out.

Han seemed to finally accept the information, but it didn’t seem to impede his determination. “All right, so the comms are off. But both of you have other means to call Luke. Use the Force. Tell him...”

“Han,” Leia interrupted him. “They don’t want to be bothered.”

“It won’t take long. I just want to be sure that Kyp is okay.”

“And I just think you’re being overprotective again! He’s not a child anymore, if he ever had been.”

“You told me the same thing eighteen years ago, too, and remember how it ended up?”

Mara looked from one of them to the other in surprise. She knew, of course, that Han and Kyp were close; however, she never guessed that Han was taking Durron’s well-being that close to heart. The worry he radiated was so intense and so parental in nature that she couldn’t believe what her senses were telling her. She would have thought that Han might care like that for Jaina, sure. Jacen, most probably. But Kyp? 

Leia didn’t seem a bit surprised, however. The way she argued with Han clearly showed that it was an old issue, discussed and quarreled over to death, and one she was less than happy with. From a mother’s point of view, Mara could sympathize totally.

“Han,” she said just to end their bickering. “I doubt it’d help, either. Luke has been shielding himself pretty damn tightly. I don’t even know if...” 

The shrill of Han’s comlink interrupted her. “Solo,” he barked into the device.

“I thought we better call before you decide to search the whole planet,” Luke’s wry voice was clearly heard by the women, although it took some effort to make out the words.

Leia tugged the comlink out of her husband’s hand and switched it to the speaker setting. “Thanks, Luke. I was starting to think about him and stun blasts in one sentence. How are you, brother?”

“We’re fine, Leia. The first couple of weeks were trying, since Kyp decided I need some excessive training in patience and nursing...” They all heard Kyp saying something in indignant tone at the background, but it was too quiet to decipher the words. “But we’re fine now. We might stay here for a bit longer, though – Kyp still has a couple of issues we haven’t figured out how to deal with yet.”

Han interrupted him. “Thanks, Luke. But if you don’t mind, I prefer to hear that from Kyp himself.”

There was some shuffle at the other end, and then Kyp’s voice came over the connection, soft, but clear. “Here, Han.”

The former smuggler exhaled loudly and slumped a bit, relaxing his stance. “You just love scaring the years out of me, don’t you?”

“Sorry, Han.” There was a hint of a smile in Kyp’s voice, but an honest regret as well. “Wasn’t my intention, trust me.”

“Are you all right?”

“Getting there. Skywalker here has been a lot of help, for a change.”

Luke’s sarcastic “Thanks for the compliment!” was clearly heard over the connection. He, apparently, was still sitting close to the comlink.

Han smiled his habitual lopsided smile. “Glad to hear that. Next time don’t be so stubborn about taking a break. Remember what I told you?”

“Yes. You were right. I just wasn’t ready to acknowledge it then. I do, now.”

“Take your time. I swear, if I hear your stupid excuses again, next time it’ll be me kicking your stubborn butt black and blue.”

“Ooooh.” This time laughter in Kyp’s voice was heard clearly. “Now I’m scared.” Then he became serious again. “Don’t worry. You know, once I’ve decided on something...”

“I know,” Han said with a note of pride. “All right, Mara is looking at me like I’ve just rigged the controls of her ship, so you better get Luke back on the line.”

“Si’te’ja, Han. Thanks for worrying about me.”

“Always do. Si’te’ja, kelys.”

Mara looked at him, shocked almost to the point of muteness, and only her years of self-discipline helped her to concentrate her mind on the talk with her husband, and not on what she had just heard. 

“Mara?” she heard Luke’s slightly worried voice over the comlink.

“Farmboy,” she said, getting her vocal cords under control. “I’m afraid you boys don’t have much time left. Cal is getting impatient, and I think the idea of carrying out a planetary search is starting to look really appealing to him. Kenth is less than happy as well.”

“Stang,” Luke said, discouraged. “How much time do we have left?”

“A week, a week and a half, tops, by my estimation. And you know, if they find you, you might be really hard pressed to explain how polishing your butts on a tropical island is more important than ruling the galaxy.”

Kyp’s strangled snort was covered by Luke’s heavy sigh. “Might be a bit uncomfortable, indeed.”

“Indeed,” Mara echoed dryly. 

“If you think that things are becoming serious, Mara, don’t try to call, all right? Just come here. I still don’t want to keep the comms on. Especially since we’re short of time.”

“Deal. Bye, farmboy.” She pressed the off button, eager to finish the conversation, to have some peace and quiet to think, and suddenly remembered that Leia didn’t have the chance to talk to her brother properly. “I’m sorry,” she said, looking at her sister-in-law contritely.

Leia waved her hand, but whatever she might have said was interrupted by another insistent beeping – this time of Mara’s comlink. “Jade Skywalker here,” she answered resignedly.

Ayddar Nylykerka’s voice on the other end was apologetic, but businesslike. “Sorry to bother, Master Jade Skywalker, but we just received a transmission from what we believe is one of your people.”

“Who?” Mara focused sharply. If the Director of Intelligence was calling about that, then it wasn’t just an ordinary ‘hello’.

“She identified herself as Jedi Knight Kirana Ti. Do you have someone by this name in the Order?”

“Yes,” Mara answered with a sinking feeling in her stomach. “Yes, we do. What it is about?”

“We don’t know. We weren’t able to decipher it yet. It’s in a language that is not in our databases. Her identification and the request to transfer her message to the Jedi Masters Luke Skywalker and Kyp Durron, or, bar that, to any Jedi Knight in the vicinity, were the only words that she said in Basic. Therefore I thought...”

“Thank you, Director. I’ll be in your office immediately.” She disconnected him and looked at her in-laws. “Kirana Ti surfaced. They got a transmission from her, but can’t understand the language.”

Han paled suddenly. “Kirana Ti? But she’s...”

“...on Dathomir, yes. Nylykerka said they can’t understand the language she used for the message.”

“Might be Old Dathomiri,” Leia said. “If so, Threepio should be able to translate it.”

“I’ll go get him,” Han said with a determined expression. 

Leia looked between them, no doubt wondering why they were taking the news with such apprehension. “Go on. I’ll go find Jacen in the meanwhile.”

“Don’t bring him here,” Mara warned. 

Leia raised her eyebrows. “Do you want me to keep him away while you two listen to it?” she asked with admirable tact.

“It might be best, Princess,” Han said frankly. 

“All right. Tell me later whatever I need to know.”

“Thanks,” Mara and Han said in unison. Both of them were out of the door in a second.

“If that’s what we fear it is,” Mara said grimly, “you might have to tie Durron up and sit on him for a long time afterwards.”

Han sighed. His face just seemed to acquire additional ten years. “So you know. Yes, and I doubt it’ll help much. Let’s just hope they’re alive.”

Mara nodded and headed to the Intelligence headquarters in quick steps. The news almost made her forget about those couple of words that Han said to Kyp at the end of their talk, but now they surfaced in her head again. _Si’te’ja_. That was nothing, just a Corellian form of good-bye, although slightly more meaningful – see you well, if she remembered correctly. But the second, shorter, word, was the one that made her wonder exactly how much she didn’t knew about the relationships in this family even after being a part of it for almost nine years.

_Kelys._

Son.

And not just any son, oh no. It was a very old Corellian word, rarely used now anywhere outside of poetry and drama, and never lightly. A word for not just any male child, but for the one that was held in highest esteem by the parents, the one who they had the most hopes for. 

Kelys. Mara wondered if Han had ever called Jacen or Anakin that. Somehow she very much doubted he had. She also wondered if Leia knew what this word meant, or just thought it being an innocent nickname. And if she did know, what made her listen to Han saying it with such an impassive expression on her face? Had she really genuinely accepted the place that a stranger held in her husband’s life, to the possible detriment of her own children – or had she simply conceded the fight?

And was this fight worth joining?


	13. Chapter 13

“You’re tense,” Luke said, sliding behind Kyp and starting to knead his shoulders. “What’s wrong?”

Kyp rolled his head, trying to get the neck muscles to relax. “Nothing. I just realized I’m still not ready to face the world outside. Even Han. I need more time... and now I’ll not be able to stop thinking about how little of it we have.”

“And you’re tempted to hurry up.”

“Yes. Despite the fact that I know I shouldn’t.”

“Because you can’t just believe that the Force would give you enough and you have to do something about it.”

He heard a smile in Kyp’s voice when the other man answered: “Precisely.”

“Control freak. What did Han say to you that you weren’t ready to hear?”

“He tried to talk me into taking a break. On Falcon, when we were returning from Ebaq 9. He noticed that something was wrong, and told me that if I didn’t stop and do, as he put it, a complete maintenance of my systems, I’d blow up.”

Luke just shook his head. His brother-in-law beat him to this realization by more than a month – and he was the one who called himself a Jedi Master. “I think I know why Cal is so unhappy with us,” he said, changing the subject. “I kind of promised him I’d talk with you about that refugee problem, and I never got around to that before we took off.”

Kyp snorted. “If he thinks I can talk Dohar into anything, he’s sadly mistaken. Not to mention that I’m totally with him and Rodan on this issue.”

“Yeah? How come?”

“If I don’t think it’s right to twist somebody’s mind to make him, say, give money to a beggar, how can I support unwanted taxations? Coercion is coercion, Luke, no matter the means.”

Luke shrugged. “I didn’t think you’d do Cal’s bidding, but I had to try. Why do you dislike him so much, by the way?”

“Because he took the seat by a fraud, and he knows that. He knew that before he took it, and he still went ahead. Now he’ll be forever afraid of getting kicked out of it, and rightfully so, and that’s the quintessential recipe for a disaster. Sooner or later he’ll become suspicious of everybody, if he hasn’t yet, and then he’ll try to prevent all the perceived attempts to take him out of power. Luke, the galaxy has seen this scheme being played out thousands of times, and not in a single case it has led to anything remotely good. I don’t have anything against him personally, but the situation is going to corrupt him, it’s inevitable.”

“You might be right about that. But we needed that standstill resolved then, and quickly.”

“Yes, the short-term resolution that might lead to a disaster in the long run. Let’s not talk about it now. We can’t afford to replace him until the end of the war anyway – you don’t hop from one ship to another in hyperspace. The sooner this war is over, the sooner we can start to sort out this mess.”

“You think we should?”

“Yes. We and the rest of the galaxy’s population. Being associated too closely with this government won’t do us any good.”

“Common sense or gut feeling?”

“Both. We really have no use as a part of the government machine; Rodan is absolutely right about that. Our strength lies in the fact that we are the third force, the one who should be totally independent and interfere only when the others are powerless or clash with each other. It’s not a comfortable position, but we have to fill it. We’re the only ones who carry enough power and authority, at least potentially, to do that.”

“That’s an interesting opinion. How exactly you think we can carry that out?”

“Luke,” Kyp said wearily. “Not now, all right? If you’re really that interested, call a meeting – Masters only, no government officials – and we can discuss it then. It’s not like it’s something we have to decide right now or else.”

“Yes, but I like to have time to think about it – I’m not a quick thinker, remember?” He tugged Kyp’s shoulders back, making the younger man lean on him, supporting his body with a loose embrace. “All right, let’s forget about politics. What would you like to do now? The sun will be coming down soon. We can go swimming, if you want.”

To his surprise, Kyp shook his head slowly. “For once, I don’t want to do anything. I just want to stay like this.” _With you_ , Luke heard the unspoken words clearly.

It was somewhat disconcerting, to see Kyp so quiet and introspective, despite the fact that it was precisely what Luke wanted him to do when they came to the island. Probably the problem was that Luke habitually expected to see some action from Kyp, and when none appeared, the energy stored in preparation for reaction demanded release.

It was incredibly ironic, that out of the two of them, Luke was starting to get restless first.

“Don’t worry, it won’t last long,” Kyp said languidly. 

“What won’t last long?”

“This passivity of mine.”

Luke threaded his fingers through the black curls, took hold of a handful of them and turned Kyp’s head, so he could see his eyes. “Reading my mind now?”

“Hmmmm?”

“It wasn’t just emotions you picked up. I suspected that for some time... Kyp, do you realize what it means?”

The black lashes came down, obscuring the green irises, but not before Luke saw the painfully familiar expression of insecurity in them. “I do. The question is, do you?”

“We’re bonding.”

“Yes. What did you expect? As open as we have been to each other during all that time, through everything... But, Luke, it’s not too late yet. We always can stop the process, probably even reverse it...”

He hugged the younger man convulsively. “No. I don’t want to stop it, or reverse it. I’m just surprised. Very stupid of me, but I didn’t realize it might happen.”

“You were too focused on my emotional pod-racing.”

“Probably.”

“Try definitely. But, Luke, do you really want it? Now when the process already started, I suspect the bond can form rapidly. Think about that, because I don’t want you agreeing now and starting to think it’s a burden later.”

“No. I told you – never again. Probably now you’ll finally believe that I’m serious.”

“You don’t have to...”

“No, I don’t have to prove anything. But I want to. My choice. I like to have you that close.” An unpleasant idea suddenly occurred to him. “Probably you don’t want it?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. After everything, you still have to ask? Seems that it’s not me who’s insecure here.”

Luke smiled. “It’s a continuous loop. Yours produces mine, mine feeds yours... it’s time to break the cycle, don’t you think?”

“Just hold me. Can’t be any simpler than that.”

Luke did. The silence that followed wasn’t uncomfortable at the slightest; the slow strokes of his hand through Kyp’s hair, the slow, synchronized breathing, the warm, pleasant heaviness of Kyp’s body against his own – it all seemed natural. For a moment Luke imagined how they must look to any observer and suddenly wished he had a holocamera. Kyp’s dark tan against his pale skin; black, curly, long hair against his dark blond, straight strands. Kyp’s long-boned elegance against his compact, ergonomic frame. They should have made quite a picture.

“Don’t fool yourself,” Kyp said suddenly.

“About what?”

“About us. We would have never had what you have with Mara... or what I can have with Jaina. I live on conflict, I thrive in it; you cherish peace and quiet. You would have become tired of me, and I’d have been irritated by you to the point of strangling you in a span of months. This is the best thing we can have – those... brief crossings of two sinusoids once in ten years or so. Why won’t you try to enjoy it without any regrets over what could have been?”

Luke thought about that. Why, indeed? “I don’t know, love,” he answered finally. “It’s not like it’s the only opportunity that passed me by in my life, but for some reason I can’t let it go. It’s not that I think we would have been better than me and Mara... filswik, I just don’t know. I must be greedy, wanting to have both.”

“Ewok battle dance,” Kyp told him calmly. “You have me. Just not in the way you’re used to associate with love. You’re too used to think in terms of all or nothing, but sometimes you just have to compromise.”

The older man chuckled. “It’s weird to hear something like that from you.”

“Why? I’m being practical, as always. When ‘all’ is impossible, and ‘nothing’ is miserable, it’s better to have at least something.”

Luke thought about that and came to the conclusion that his surprise was, indeed, unjustified. Sure, Kyp’s passionate, outspoken manners gave the impression that he was rigid in his convictions, when, in fact, out of two of them Luke was the real dogmatic, less willing to compromise than his fiery, but much more attuned to reality friend. “You’re right,” he said, leaning forward to kiss the bridge of Kyp’s nose. “I’m being idealistic again.”

Kyp chuckled. “For some reason I don’t mind right now. Just get over this mood before Mara gets here. I don’t want to find myself at the business end of her blaster.”

“She gave you her word, remember?”

His companion snorted. “As if she can really take me. You know, you two are not as different as you think. In her own way, she’s as idealistic as you are – her ideas are just different. But holding on to the opinion she formed after knowing me back then for what, half of a day, if I’m not mistaken?...for almost twenty years seems a bit over the top. What did you do to make her change her tune?”

“Walked her through my memories of that night. In full.”

The body in his hands became rigid. “What?”

Luke shrugged. “It was the only thing I could think of. She’d caught some glimpses out of my memories, and constructed a very warped picture out of it. I doubt very much that anything I could have said would’ve been able to satisfy her, so I had to show her the real thing instead of the one she imagined. And it worked.”

Kyp twisted, dislodging his arms. “I can’t believe it! I just can’t believe it! What the kriff were you thinking, showing it to her like... some porno flick!”

Luke reached for him, but Kyp shook off his hands angrily. “No wonder she was leering at me! Voyeuristic streak, indeed! Can’t get any more revealing than that! Are you going to amuse her with what we have been doing here, as well?”

“I doubt very much it was amusing, on both sides.” He extended his hands toward his lover again, and this time he didn’t allow Kyp to push him away. “Listen to me,” he said, taking a hold of Kyp’s face and looking straight into the blazing green eyes. “Where are all your talks about compromises now? I tried not to talk to her about this, and all it brought was that she hated your guts. That day, she was ready to break up with me, for good, and I know her, she would have done that! I was trying to save us all – me from the crash of my marriage and you from having her at your throat in earnest! Not to mention saving her from this hatred that was starting to poison her mind to the point I was barely recognizing the woman I love! If you think it was easy on me or her, or amusing, you’re very much mistaken. But, love, sometimes you have to choose the best out of bad options. Remember Sernpidal?”

This one word finally penetrated Kyp’s outrage, bursting it like a balloon, and Luke felt the resistance against his hands receding. “Jaina slapped me then,” Kyp said sullenly.

“Did she? Feel free to slap me, too, if it makes you feel better. I know it wasn’t the right thing to do. The problem is, all other options were worse.” He kissed the tightly pressed, unyielding lips, not demanding entrance, but asking for it, pushing all his love and remorse through their fledging bond until he felt them soften under his touch, opening, submitting...

“You don’t play fair,” Kyp exhaled, still with a note of bitterness in his voice.

“Yeah, well, this outdated concept of fairness...”

Kyp chuckled, almost involuntary. “I wish you applied that to the war.” Then he looked at Luke again, startled. “Wait a minute. So she knows about my kids now?”

“Yes.”

“Great. Just great!”

“Kyp, she will never do any harm to them, surely you know that?”

“I still don’t like it,” the younger man answered morosely. “It becomes much more widespread knowledge than I like it to be.”

“You can’t hide them forever. Sooner or later they’ll have to come to the praxeum, and that would be the end of this secrecy. I understand why you thought it was necessary when they were younger, but now?”

“Two words, Skywalker, or, rather, three – Peace Brigade and the Vongs!”

Luke chuckled. “Now that’s paranoid even by your standards. The Vongs are upon them already, like they are upon any Force user in this Galaxy, and they will be until the end of this war. Nothing will change that. And about the Peace Brigade... I doubt the brigadiers are brave enough to set a foot on Dathomir, and, besides, how many of them are left after you ironed out Ylesia? Get used to the idea, Kyp – in any case, I doubt you’ll be able to keep them in the nest for much longer, not with their genes!”

Kyp didn’t say anything, but the rueful twist of his lips clearly showed that he couldn’t deny that Luke was right. 

“Did you manage to get in touch with Alleinn?” Luke asked with interest.

“Only for a second. It’s just too bloody far away,” Kyp complained. “He was all right – alive and unharmed, at least. But... frantic. Worried. I must have really scared him.”

Luke looked at him and decided that bringing to Kyp’s attention that Alleinn might have been worried about someone else might not be a wise decision.

***

“Translate it word for word, Threepio,” Mara said curtly. “As close as possible. We don’t want to miss any possible hidden meanings.”

“Why, Mistress Mara, my qualification as an interpreter...”

“Stuff it, Goldenrod. Just do what she says.”

“Of course, Master Han, but...”

Two irritated groans mixed together rather harmonically, and that finally gave a gold-covered droid a clue. “I’m ready,” he announced hastily.

“We’re delighted,” Mara answered sarcastically and pressed the play button.

There was some sound of static at first, then a low female voice with a slight, unusual accent began to speak: “This is Jedi Knight Kirana Ti transmitting messages for Jedi Masters Luke Skywalker and Kyp Durron. I repeat: this is Jedi Knight Kirana Ti transmitting messages for Jedi Masters Luke Skywalker and Kyp Durron. I ask anyone who hears me to transfer this message to them, or, if this is impossible, to any Jedi Knight you might meet.”

“It’s Kirana Ti’s voice,” Mara interrupted, pressing the pause. “No doubt about that.”

“I agree,” nodded Han. “Continue.”

The next words were said in another language, which Threepio started to translate dutifully after only a slight pause. “Greetings, brothers.”

“Actually,” the droid interrupted himself, “it’s not exactly ‘brothers’. I think the meaning of the word is closer to ‘he-sister’...”

Han and Mara stifled their irritation, remembering that they gave the annoying droid an order to make the translation as close to the original as possible. “Figures,” Han said quickly. “Continue, Threepio.”

“I don’t know if you will be able to hear me, but I’m sending this message in the hope you do. It is my one and only hope; the batteries on this comm are already running low, and I might not have a chance for another attempt. I hope that the Order and the New Republic still stand strong. Otherwise, we’re doomed.”

Han and Mara looked at each other. Both knew what it meant for a Dathomiri to make such a confession.

“We have been battling the invaders on this planet for three years, and now our resources are coming to an end. We have lost too many fighters; our numbers are diminished by more than half, and most of those who are left are men and children. Because of the war we haven’t have a chance to gather provisions, and now our food supplies are all but exhausted. We need help; we need food, we need medical supplies, but above all, we need weapons. We’re going to fight until the last Sister is dead, rather than surrender our planet to those beings, but I’d rather fight and live.

“What gives me hope is that the occupiers seem to grow tired and less numerous, as well. They haven’t received any reinforcement in months, and their supply runs are getting less and less frequent. I spent almost a month looking at the sky; it seems they have only one big ship in orbit now. I hope it means that the war is starting to get too heavy on them to continue holding onto our planet stubbornly; now might be a good time for the New Republic to take it back, or at least to deliver us supplies so we can continue our fight. 

“Mother Augwynne Djo is dead. Now I’m the temporary ruler of the United Clans. I’m putting out an official request for help, to the New Republic government, and to anyone who might be willing to give us a helping hand. If that doesn’t happen, if my message arrives too late, please know that we died, but never surrendered.

“Here ends my official message. The next part is intended only for Kyp Durron, so if you are not him and still listening, please stop now and pass it on to him.”

Mara once again pressed the pause. “Should we?”

Han rolled his eyes. “As much as I respect the kid’s privacy, I’m not going to give him this message before I find out if I should immobilize him prior to listening.”

The redhead smiled. “That’s what I thought.” She switched the recorder back. “Continue, Threepio.”

“But, Mistress Mara...”

“Continue!”

Threepio knew better than argue with Master Han when he used that tone. 

The voice on the recording changed, subtly, but noticeably. Instead of the official impassivity there were the notes of impatience and irritation in it now. “Kyp, my brother, thankfully, I know you are alive, even if you made your children crazy with worry. I don’t know what is going on with you, but you better pull yourself together, and quickly. We need you. Even if the New Republic refuses to give us help, I know you will find your way back home. You are the only one who can easily get in and out, especially now, when our orbit is not as heavily guarded as it was. 

Kirana’s voice turned grave. “I have bad news for you, brother. Eygenna is badly wounded, and if she does not receive medical help soon, she is going to die. She lost a lot of blood, and there seem to be a widespread infection inside her body. Her heart tried to stop more than once already. Only the combined strength of all our healers is able to keep her alive, but this can’t continue indefinitely. We need to get her to a real medicenter if we want her to live.”

“Eygenna?” Mara asked in puzzlement. “Who’s Eygenna?”

“Kirana’s sister. She’s the mother of Kyp’s girls, and a foster mother to his son as well.”

Mara whistled. “That’s bad. At least it seems that the children are all right.”

“The message hasn’t ended yet, Mara.”

“True.” She gave a nod to the droid to continue.

But, to their surprise, instead of Kirana’s low tones, what came over the record were a brief hubbub and then a high-pitched young male voice, which was almost screaming: “Dad, it’s me, Alleinn. Father, what’s wrong? I swear, if I don’t feel you better soon, I’m going to find a ship and fly over, even if I have to steal one of those oversized flying stones for that! I’m not a child anymore, and I can fight!”

“Alleinn!” bellowed Kirana’s voice. “How did you get here? Out, immediately!”

Still the same young voice, more distant now: “I love you, Dad. I miss you. We all do. Come back, please!”

Mara chuckled. “Seems that Kyp's disrespect for authority might be genetic.”

Han laughed as well. “No Sith, as Kyp would have said. At least the little pest is alive and well.”

The note of affection in Han’s voice was unmistakable, and Mara inquired: “You know him?”

“I visited them with Kyp once or twice. The kid wanted so much to brag about his offspring that I couldn’t refuse. It’s not like he had a lot of people to brag to, after all.”

“Oh my,” intruded the excited electronic voice. “Oh my! Master Han, do I understand correctly that Master Kyp has children? Such happy news! I can’t wait to tell Artoo about that!”

“No!” Han and Mara chorused, horrified. “You won’t tell that to anyone, Threepio,” Han said matter-of-factly. “Or do I need to apply a selective memory wipe?”

“But, Master Han...”

“No buts. This information is not going anywhere, Goldenrod. Even to Artoo. Understand?”

“Yes, Master Han,” the droid said sullenly.

“Just for the record, how many people do know?” Mara asked Han.

“Outside of Dathomir? Me and Luke. You, now. Kirana Ti, obviously. Teneniel Djo knew, and Tenel Ka should know, as well, she spent too much time there not to know. Other than that, no one.”

“Not even Leia?”

“No. Kyp has been paranoid about that.”

“Not a big circle, indeed. All right, let’s listen further.”

Now Kirana’s voice was back, and this time it was definitely laced with tiredness and irritation. “Kyp, get here and get them off my hands! They are becoming unmanageable, even the girls. They think they are accomplished fighters already. I dread the day when I’m not able to keep track of them and they find something that is well above their abilities. I don’t want to see them killed – they are our brightest hope. And we have too many orphans now to have the luxury of keeping the ones who have a living parent to take care of them. Come home, Kyp. We are waiting. End of message.”

“Well,” drawled Han. “Any ideas about what we’re going to do now?”

“ _Not_ delivering this message right away,” Mara said firmly. “It sounds like this trip will require much more than just hopping into an X-wing and flying straight ahead. And, if I’m not mistaken, it’s exactly what Durron is likely to do upon receiving this message.”

Han drummed his fingers on a desk. “Agreed. Listen, Mara, you might be closer to this kitchen now than I am – what are the chances that our high and mighty will send a force to free Dathomir?”

“Pretty slim,” Mara told him frankly. “It’s not an important planet... for anyone but us.”

“That’s what I thought. All right, we’re not doing this the official way. If we ask, it’s going to go through the usual bureaucratic channels, and Kyp will be a grandfather by the time they decide to move a finger. Smugglers Squadron it is, then.” He smiled his trademark lopsided smile. “I bet Booster will be thrilled to carry some more Jedi brats as passengers. I think he’s starting to get bored.”

Mara smirked. “Booster might do that just for the pleasure of doing a favor to Kyp and, concomitantly, ruffling Corran’s feathers.”

Han shrugged. “That’s an added bonus, but, actually, they are old friends. You didn’t know?”

“Who?” Mara asked, surprised. “Terrik and Durron? What do they have in common, for Force’s sake?”

“Kessel,” Han said succinctly. “Booster never cared much for Kyp’s parents, but he liked the kid.”

“They were in the mines together?” Han nodded. “Huh. I didn’t know that.”

“Well, now you do. Let’s return to our problem. I can provide the military side for this operation, but what about everything else? Food supplies, medical supplies... I have to admit, all of us are rather short of resources right now, even Karrde and Lando. The last months sucked everybody dry.”

Mara smiled suddenly. “Don’t worry about that. I think I know who to ask.”

Han looked at her, surprised. “Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“Oooooh-kay. There is only one thing left, then.”

“Which is?”

“Reconnaissance.” He switched on his comlink and entered a quick combination. 

“Capt’n Fenig Nabon,” said a rough female voice on the other end, after a short pause.

“Fen, it’s Solo. Remember what I told you about that supply run I wanted you to make? Well, scratch that altogether. I have another job for you...”


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is sex here. Penetrative anal sex, to be exact. Don't like? Don't read.
> 
> \---------------------------------------------------------------

Luke hissed quietly when the warm, prickly jets of water hit his skin, which drew immediate attention from his shower-mate. “Sensitive?” Kyp asked with a smirk.

“Just make the water about five degrees colder, all right? And stop sneering! It’s your fault. If you don’t get burned by the sun, it doesn’t mean everybody else is immune as well.”

“I thought that after living on Tatooine for twenty years, ‘everybody else’ would have known about getting out of the sun in time, or at least using sunscreen!”

“Eighteen,” Luke corrected automatically. “Eighteen years, not twenty... and it’s still your fault. We didn’t have to go climbing. I did propose diving, didn’t I?”

“And I proposed just staying in bed – now what was wrong with that?”

Luke gave him a look that he tried his humble best to make derogatory enough. “We needed exercise. Sex isn’t the only physical activity in the world. We have to stay in shape.”

As an answer, the other man just stretched. Nothing more than that, but the innocuous motion made all the muscles under the tanned skin shift and define themselves in sharp relief, highlighted by the water streaming down his body. Then he cocked his head, as if asking: _Still think I’m not in shape?_

Luke just rolled his eyes. At this rate they would forego conversation with words altogether in less than a week.

The water started to grow colder, and Luke leaned back in relief. Fifteen or twenty minutes in a light trance, and he would be as good as new. He didn’t actually hold it against Kyp that his lover dragged him, shirtless and barefoot, to climb all over the rocky part of the island, which was actually almost the same size as the Great Temple on Yavin 4, only much less stable and smooth. At least he had managed to defend his pants – that was all he could have done after he stupidly agreed to Kyp’s proposition of making it ‘close to nature.’

He had got his revenge, though. Not half an hour into the climb, Kyp lost his balance, when a piece of rock he stepped on proved to be imbedded in the earth much more shallowly than he thought. The slide he took as a result might have given him a lot more than a couple of scratches, if not for the durable material of the working pants he wore. However, the garment hadn’t been exactly new, and the strain made them tear in the most interesting places. For the rest of the climb Luke had the pleasure of being flashed generously by the parts of the firm, tanned buttocks clearly visible in the horizontal rips that reached from one seam of a trouser-leg to another. Kyp really had bad luck with pants lately.

Luke was pretty sure that Kyp, for all his casual attitude, was hurting as much as he was, if not more. The aforementioned fall had given him some pretty nasty bruises all over his upper legs and buttocks, bad enough to be noticeable even under the dark tan. Luke had also suspected that stepping on a patch of eroded stones, with sharp and brittle edges barely covered by sand, was much more painful than Kyp pretended it to be. He hadn’t had to ask why the younger man rejected diving, however; he sensed that as soon as his proposition hung in the air. Too many memories that had been brought uncomfortably close to surface, and made more bitter than happy by the remembrance of what followed the joyful days on Deyer. He should have known. They still weren’t out of the asteroid field, after all.

He traced the outline of the biggest bruise on Kyp’s hip, feeling the swelling under his fingertips. “This is bad. Why didn’t you just say something? We could have returned home; it's not like our lives depended on this climb.”

Kyp waived his concerns aside. “It’s just pain. I know how to block it. Want me to wash your back?”

Luke winced. “Not now.”

“I’ll be gentle with you,” Kyp said very solemnly.

After such a promise, Luke couldn’t refuse. And ‘gentle’ was indeed the correct word; the familiar hands, sleeked with cleanser, ghosted over his body with almost painfully evident care and control. The last weeks, filled with the abundance of water and sand, took the roughness off Kyp’s palms, making them smooth enough to be felt, but not irritating to Luke’s inflamed skin. “Kyp, you’d better stop it,” he said, against his will. “If you don’t, I’ll turn into jelly and you’ll have to carry me into the house.”

He felt a light kiss being planted between his shoulder blades. “I’ll tell you a secret,” Kyp said conspiratorially. “The deck outside is smooth and warmed by the sun. I’ll just leave you there for solidifying.”

“How is it that I’m dead on my feet,” Luke complained, “and you still are able to stay upright?”

Kyp snickered. “My amazing willpower, of course. Actually, I’m just as beat as you are.”

“All right,” Luke said determinedly. “As soon as we’re out of the shower, we’re going into a trance, and I’m not really picky – I can do it on the floor!”

He had just enough energy left to return the courtesy and help Kyp to wash the dirt and dried blood from his body. After that they stumbled out of the shower cabin and stretched out on the decking that was indeed quite warm and nice-smelling, and in that moment, he could have sworn, even seemed to be soft. Luke sighed happily and started to go through the familiar preparations.

He didn’t have to have the benefit of sight to know that his lover was already entering the trance. Kyp had been right; the bond between them was growing stronger every hour. Soon they might need to talk about barriers and shielding, and delineating the areas of access... soon, but not just yet. Luke wanted to have some time to relish this closeness. Right now, though, Kyp’s meditative state was tugging him along, rather insistently.

Trance first. Then they’d have to talk again – or fuck. One inevitably led to the other these days, and Luke didn’t particularly care for the order.

“You’re a hypocrite, Kyp,” Luke said unexpectedly half an hour later, when they both had healed, but still for some reason were lying on the hospitable warm wood instead of the nearest sofa. The remark wasn’t as incongruous as it would seem to a bystander. Sex was always close on their minds, and now the tide of mutual desire was on the rise again, slowly, but very surely, and with it, however pleasant it was, came the inevitable question of what Kyp was going to do once their vacation was over. It was in the background all the time, a dark cloud on an otherwise relatively clear sky.

Kyp didn’t disappoint. The speed with which he turned his head around almost gave him a whiplash. “Now what this is about?” he asked, more puzzled than angry.

“Octa,” Luke answered. “You can’t possibly be unaware that she loves you.”

“Oh, that. Yes, I know. _She_ doesn’t know yet.”

“She does now. You scared her pretty badly.”

Kyp sighed. “The eternal story. Why do we realize what someone means to us only on the verge of losing him or her?”

Luke froze with a glass of juice that he had Force-commanded from the table beside the bathtub halfway to his mouth. “Am I supposed to answer?”

Kyp smiled bleakly. “No, the question is perfectly rhetorical. I still don’t see how it makes me a hypocrite.” 

“You can’t give her all, so you decided to make her miserable by giving nothing, instead of giving at least something?”

“Oh. It could look that way... but, Luke, she never propositioned me.”

“And you, of course, always wait for a proposition.”

“Well, yes.” He caught Luke’s mocking gaze and amended: “You were an exception. One of the very few, believe me. I don’t proposition people that might be afraid to refuse... for whatever reason.” 

Subordinates, people who are weaker, who might be afraid of the horrible fame of the Destroyer of Worlds... Yes, Luke could see why the list of people who Kyp Durron might have the luxury to proposition to would be pretty short. “I don’t think Octa is afraid of you.”

“Afraid, no... but she might think she owes me. But I see what you mean – I won’t kick her out of my bed, definitely, if she ever finds the guts to get into it.”

“She thinks she owes you for taking her back?”

“Yes. I tried to talk her out of that particular guilt trip, but without success so far. I hope she’ll get over it one day. It’s far too draining.”

Luke laughed quietly. “You should take your own advice. You still think you owe me for the very same thing, don’t you?”

“Not anymore.”

This answer was laced with so many hidden meanings that it took Luke a couple of minutes to digest, and after that he decided it would be better not to continue down this particular lane. “Talk with her,” he said in the end. “I think in this case you might afford to take the initiative.”

“Uh-huh. Why you’re talking about this now?”

“You’ve been thinking about something pretty hard the whole day. I thought that was what bothered you, no?”

“No. Well,” Kyp amended, “it was one of the things. But not the most important.”

Luke left the question of what was important unspoken, knowing that Kyp would hear it anyway.

“How long are you going to continue shielding me?” Kyp asked suddenly. It wasn’t what Luke thought he would say first. “It defies the purpose, don’t you think – to shield The Shield?”

The older man raised his head from the crossed hands he was lying on and stared at him, dumbfounded in the extreme. “You got that through the bond?”

Kyp seemed to be equally perplexed. “No. Wait! You’ve known?”

Luke closed his eyes and counted to ten. “All right. Let’s start at the beginning. Yes, I know. No grand revelations this time, just a guess that seemed to be incredibly right. Jaina and you... it fits, perfectly. How did you know?”

His lover seemed to be extremely fascinated by the patterns in the wood planks. “Vima visited me... not long before Sernpidal.”

“Vima Da Boda?” That surprised Luke. He thought that Kyp’s first teacher had been long dead. “You mean...”

“No. Not in the flesh. She’s dead, Luke... resting in peace, finally, in the Force. She won’t come again. One last message, she said, for her last student. And, as you can guess, I didn’t like it one bit. I hate to be a puppet of anyone, even my destiny. But I had to do what I had to do, regardless.”

“What exactly did she say?”

“’You have to cover’, she said. ‘When others’ abilities come to end, when they can’t, or won’t, do what’s needed to be done, you have to cover for them. You are The Shield, designed to stay tough when others are failing.’ Then she smirked and added: ‘A dirty job, my boy, but someone has to do it.’ You know, I always considered that old witch smile of hers to be really infuriating.”

Luke lifted one eyebrow. “And you haven’t told her to get back to whatever Hell spawned her with this revelation? You must be getting soft, love.”

“Of course I did!” Kyp said indignantly. “That is, by the way, the thing that I thought Jaina ought to do after your grand announcement to her. At least it might have made an impression on you. Vima just laughed in my face. The vapin’ crone knew I won’t be able to disregard what she said, I owe her too much for that.”

“She was right. Someone has to do it. Trust me, if I could spare you and Jaina this burden, I would. I know what it’s like to live a life shadowed by Destiny.”

Kyp gave him a quick, sideways glance. “Yeah. You just might.”

They lay in silence for some time, then Luke answered Kyp’s original question. “I don’t think it defies anything, Kyp. Take this either way – either you’re a human being in your own right, or you’re a tool of Destiny – but every being needs help from time to time, and every tool needs maintenance to work properly. Do you still feel everything as keenly as when we came here?”

“How would I know? You’re keeping me wrapped in your field, so practically all I feel is you.”

“All right, I’ll be specific. Any changes since yesterday?”

“No. Why?”

Luke successfully suppressed a yell of victory, but it was a close thing. His smile, though, could have lighted up a good portion of the Kessel mines. “Because I thinned the cocoon by half yesterday. And you didn’t even feel it. That means that my theory is working.”

Kyp rose up on his elbows. “What theory?”

“I assumed that you had some natural barrier that protected you from being overloaded emotionally, other than the shields that you built up since you became a Jedi. Otherwise it’s unexplainable how you were able to function prior to that. Something like the skin that protects the body, only it’s not material in this case. I don’t know what it is, but I started to think of your problem based on this assumption. Whatever happened on Ebaq 9 damaged this barrier. Think of it as a very bad and extensive scrape, or a burn. And, given that it has been constantly irritated since then, it never had a chance to heal, until I started to keep you under my wrap.”

Kyp cocked his head in contemplation. “Hmmm. Sounds rational...”

“...for a change,” Luke supplied wryly.

“For a change,” Kyp agreed, with a tiny smile. “So you think that this mental ‘skin’ is healed now?”

“I’d give it a couple of days more, just to be sure. If I’m right, and the analogy works all the way through, you might even get a kind of a scab that’d thicken the barrier for a while and make you less sensitive than usual.”

“It’s a disturbing thought,” Kyp said slowly. “On some level, at least. But I can use being not distracted for some time. Thank you... I’d have never thought of it that way.”

“Hard to be objective when you’re suffering from it. Listen, not that I don’t like this floor, but...”

“Yeah, I’m ready for something a bit more comfortable, too.” Kyp made a face. “We’re getting too used to all this opulence, aren’t we?”

“So that’s what it was about? Getting un-used to comfort? Going climbing shirtless and barefoot is nothing short of masochistic!”

Kyp hauled himself upright and extended a hand to Luke. “Exactly. One shouldn’t forget how to be miserable – it’s much more fun this way!”

They settled in the kitchen and, to Luke’s surprise, this time it was Kyp who volunteered to cook. The older man didn’t object, although, to his taste, Kyp was always too heavy on the spices. It gave him an opportunity to sit back quietly and watch. The corner sofa was wide and comfortable, so nothing distracted him from the sight of those endless legs and small buttocks, the shift of the muscles on the broad back when those deft hands cut and chopped meat and vegetables, and the familiar slight angle of that long neck half-covered by the heavy, disheveled ponytail, twisted and folded twice against the nape. 

He didn’t tell Kyp, but he was also acutely aware of the time ticking by. A week and a half, Mara had said, and that was a generous estimation. Five or seven days, and it would be over. The camaraderie they established would last, surely, and so would their bond, but Luke felt that he still hadn’t got his fill of this beautiful body, of the feel of the velvety soft skin over steely muscles under his fingers and lips, of the taste and smell, of everything they would have to forego once their lives were back on their usual track. Mara had been wrong about that. He wasn’t going to get Kyp out of his system, even if he spent another month or two fucking him silly; he might just as well stop fooling himself and admit it. Kyp was already in his blood. Always had been.

The wave of desire hit him with such a force that his mouth went dry and his teeth started to ache. It was as strong and insistent, and just as swift to come, as during that first, desperate night. Suddenly he had trouble breathing, filled with heavy, throbbing arousal that made moving, kriff, even speaking, impossible. He had to ride this wave, and then... well, dinner could wait a couple of hours more.

Kyp turned and looked at him with a cocky smile. “Want something?”

“Get over here,” Luke answered hoarsely, not bothering with niceties.

Kyp obligingly took the necessary steps, still with the same self-assured, knowing smile. “I wondered when you’d finally snap.”

“Snap?” Luke asked, with one hand on Kyp’s backside and another stroking his lover’s rapidly filling cock.

“Out of your control. I know you wanted to take it slow, to savor it... but I need your kindness about as much as you need my artistry. I just want to get fucked, before I lose my resolve...” His voice was becoming shaky and breathless. “...and I want to feel all your desire and all your love while you’re doing it... with nothing held back. So I can replace those damned memories with something that will be worth remembering.”

Oh. So that was how Kyp wanted it. Not a slow, cherishing lovemaking, but a wild abandon that would be so like those couplings that had left the festering wounds on his psyche, and so unlike at the same time, because this time, it would be out of love.

Nothing held back. He could manage that.

He didn’t have to tell Kyp to open up to him mentally. Kyp was as open to him as possible, already pouring his exaltation, just slightly tingled with apprehension and fear, into their bond. Luke didn’t know what he was giving in return, what exactly Kyp was able to separate out of the complex mix of emotions he was feeling, but he hoped it would be enough to cut the old wounds open and rinse them clean. He was going to flood Kyp’s consciousness with love, drown him in it, until it would be the only thing that remained. 

One swift pull, and Kyp was seated on his lap, with his knees on both sides of Luke’s hips. Not too close, not yet. He still had his left hand on Kyp’s cock, and he batted off Kyp’s eager hands from his own. “No,” he exhaled. “This one is for you.” He intended to save every bit of his arousal for the things to come. By all gods in the galaxy, presently worshipped or not, Kyp was going to get what he asked for, in full.

Neither of them wanted, or needed, preliminaries. There was, however, one thing Luke absolutely refused to forego. “Oil?” he asked, panting.

“I can do it wi...”

“We’re doing it my way. Oil?”

Kyp groaned impatiently and stretched his hand back. A small bottle shot into it almost at the speed of a blaster bolt, and the younger man practically tore the cap off in his eagerness, splashing easily half of the liquid on his palm, and virtually falling forward onto Luke’s erection, smearing it and all the surrounding skin in thick, strong-smelling Zaffa oil. “Happy now?” he all but snarled at Luke. 

Instead of answering, Luke guided Kyp’s hips forward, pointing his cock up with the other hand. Suddenly, as if something clicked inside his lover’s head, he felt the change in Kyp’s feel and his body language. The apprehension and fear were eradicated from the stream of emotions he was receiving from his lover, replaced by an acute, almost painful anticipation that was overcoming all other emotions rapidly, squeezing out the will and the control. The body under his hand went lax, as lax as it could manage to be and still retain the position. With a sobering chill Luke understood what it meant. Kyp was giving himself up, fully, surrendering all he had to Luke. The question was, was it a conscious gesture, or the ingrained reflex of a sex slave rousing up from the depths of his memory?

“Love?” he whispered, frightened. 

“Still me,” Kyp answered, slowly, with his eyes closed. “Still here. You’re Luke Skywalker; I’m Kyp Durron, and right now, I’m yours. Because I want it.”

A gift freely given, then, and Luke could do nothing but accept it with grace. “Thank you,” he whispered, applying pressure with his hand, directing Kyp’s hips down, slowly. Lower. Lower still. Here!

The tight entrance opened before the sleek invader slowly, reluctantly. Whatever sexual excesses had taken place in Kyp’s past, they were clearly that – a distant past. He was tight. Wonderfully, horribly, virginally tight, so much that it was taking all of Luke’s control not to drive in like his body demanded him to, hard and fast. He went slowly instead, stopping immediately after encountering the increased resistance, withdrawing, then thrusting back, just as slowly, but a tiny increment deeper this time. Out, again. In, again.

Kyp wasn’t trying to take over, but to prevent even the possibility, Luke placed both of his hands on his lover’s narrow hips, directing each movement exactly. His teeth ached from the force with which he clenched them, but he proceeded at the same speed, with each inward movement stretching Kyp just a little bit more. For anyone who was familiar with the peculiar pleasures of anal intercourse, these first moments of penetration, this gradual stretching, was a pleasure in itself, made even more acute by being borderline painful. The trick was not to cross that line, and Luke was doing his best to keep it on the safe side, despite his lover’s desperate whimpers. 

And then, when he was already three quarters inside, he thrust in, forcefully, but not too fast, aiming for the prostate gland and nailing it perfectly, judging by Kyp’s hoarse yell and the way his body went rigid in Luke’s hands, as if electrified. His lover was so very close to orgasm that Luke just couldn’t drag it out anymore; if he kept it up a minute longer than needed, the release was going to be more painful than pleasant, and that was unacceptable.

He withdrew almost all the way out, and then pressed Kyp down rapidly, surging up to meet him. Then again, and again, with each thrust just a little bit quicker and harder than the previous one, finishing Kyp off with focused determination, so intent on his partner’s pleasure that his own need went almost unnoticed.

When he felt that his lover was tottering on the brink, he reached down toward the place where their bodies met, and coated his hand in the leftovers of oil Kyp had bathed him in so liberally. And then, with a perfectly timed synchronicity, the tight circle of his fingers went down on Kyp’s shaft, at the same time as Luke’s cock went up his lover’s ass in the most powerful, hardest surge he could muster in this position.

Kyp gasped. His body arched backwards like a tight bow, rigid and trembling, and Luke felt his internal muscles starting to spasm, irregularly, but so strongly! Luke kept thrusting, very lightly, just to amplify the already powerful rush of pleasure that overflowed from Kyp. He felt the big vessel under his fingers starting to pulse, propelling the hot, viscous ejaculate, but all his attention was on his lover’s face, frozen in the familiar mask of rapture Luke remembered so well.

He felt the hot splashes that landed on his chest and shoulder, somehow miraculously avoiding his face, but paid them no more than a fleeting acknowledgement. His lover’s pleasure was so intense that he was having trouble not coming as well, but he didn’t want it to be over yet. They were doing it his way, and he still had much more to give. 

Kyp sagged, leaning on him heavily, and Luke embraced him eagerly, settling the black-haired head on his shoulder tenderly and stroking Kyp's slumped back. He was worried a bit that in Kyp’s post-orgasmic, overly sensitive state, having a still erect cock up his ass might be irritating, but their connection reassured him. There were no signs of discomfort in the feelings that poured out from Kyp; in fact, if someone asked right now, he would have probably readily opted for being impaled on Luke’s cock forever.

Suddenly Luke became aware that his shoulder was wet, and not from sweat or come, but from hot, burning tears. Kyp was weeping, quietly, and his hands were tightening convulsively around Luke’s shoulders. But they weren’t the tears of regret, or pain; they were the tears brought out by the amazed wonder that something he had been so afraid of for so long could feel so good and so safe, and immense gratitude.

Luke hugged him even tighter, as if they might become fused, joined forever, in body as well as soul, by the force of his will alone. “So brave,” he whispered in Kyp’s ear. “So beautiful.”

They stayed like that, clutching each other, for immeasurable time, until, finally, Kyp started to come out of his catharsis. Of course, the first bit of surrounding reality that penetrated his mind was a durasteel hard piece of flesh penetrating his behind. He raised his head and looked at Luke with the eyes that were still wet and surrounded by glued together, spiky lashes. “You haven’t...”

Luke, who kept himself distracted by focusing totally on his partner, smiled. “No. I was saving it.” Truth to tell, now, when the tidal waves of Kyp’s orgasm and the following emotional meltdown receded from his consciousness, Luke was starting to feel rather desperate.

“For what?” Kyp asked naively. 

“For loving you,” Luke answered, wiping the smudge of come from Kyp’s cheekbone with his thumb. “What else? Take your own advice and stop thinking, love. Just feel. Feel me, in you, and how wonderful it feels, to be buried in you, so deeply that if I wanted, I could believe we are really one. How it feels to have you around me, so hot and so compliant, how it feels to have you giving yourself so generously. How it feels to love you, with the full knowledge of what an amazing being you are. Look at yourself through my eyes, Kyp. See yourself as _I_ see you. As many others see you...” 

Even as he spoke he could feel Kyp sliding back into their little world that consisted of only the two of them, tied together by an invisible cord, and melding his perception with Luke’s. Just as he expected, Kyp’s cock was starting to fill up again, fueled by Luke’s arousal, although the process was much slower than the first time around.

A jarring note of discomfort startled Luke, and it took him a second to identify that it was coming from Kyp. His legs were starting to cramp. Luke, ashamed that he hadn’t thought about that – the position was certainly comfortable for him, but much less so for his partner – started to withdraw, but Kyp grabbed his shoulders painfully. “No!” he said fervently. “Don’t go!”

Luke, who wanted the separation about as much as his lover, quickly found a solution, and, while Kyp was still clutching at him, flipped them around. Now Kyp was half-sitting, half-lying on the couch, and Luke was kneeling on the floor between his spread legs, stroking and massaging them. “That’s better,” Kyp said, smiling dreamily. “I want to feel you come. Come for me?”

The older man leaned forward and kissed him. “Whatever you want, love,” he answered. Then he began to move, in tiny, almost unnoticeable random thrusts, designed to tease rather than satisfy. Very soon Kyp started to gasp quietly with each one, and his legs came up to wrap around Luke’s waist, although he still didn’t try to dictate anything, even the rhythm and depth of the thrusts, and suddenly Luke realized with crystal clarity why. He wasn’t sure before; it certainly seemed to him that Kyp might have been trying to play out the old scenario with the new substance, he even said that much. Now, however, Kyp’s passivity came from a totally different source: the total, complete certainty that Luke would understand what was needed without any directions, and bring him to satisfaction without being told how. 

Such an absolute trust touched Luke so much that it almost brought tears to his eyes. Judging by Kyp’s happy abandon, it was something new for him, and Luke rejoiced at the idea that in a very important sense, he was going to be Kyp’s first; for some reason it aroused primeval instincts he never thought he possessed. 

His control was starting to slip; finally, Luke allowed himself to abandon any conscious thought altogether. The only things left were the feel of a tight, sleek channel around his cock, a now fully erect, twitching shaft under his fingers, and the feeling of unhurried, languid arousal that was coming from, seemingly, everywhere, mirroring and amplifying his own. He wanted to give it to Kyp slowly, tenderly, and he did, but somewhere along the road both of them stopped caring for tenderness, and grew tired of slow, and now Luke was speeding up, fucking Kyp hard and fast, and Kyp was cheering him up mentally, relishing the force Luke was unleashing on him, because it was what he wanted, the whole measure, given without reserve.

 _Come for me_ , Luke heard again, and, unable to refuse, he did, pouring his soul and a couple of spoonfuls of semen into his lover, crying out Kyp’s name with each thrust, with each spurt, as if it might have helped to carve his mark on this extraordinary man, and erase any previous one that other people had ever imbedded in him.

And, when the last shudder died in his body, he saw Kyp raising his hand and starting to stroke himself, with Luke’s half-erect cock still buried wholly in his ass. Luke saw his lover going through the motions that should have been a pinnacle of self-gratification, but, somehow, Luke was sure that Kyp was doing it for him and for him alone, in full knowledge that he would never be able to forget the picture of Kyp coming for him, so he could see and memorize every detail, every gasp and every shift of expression on this handsome face.

Oh yes, they marked each other, all right. The scars from burning iron would have been easier to get rid of.


	15. Chapter 15

“So, how is our little operation going?”

Leia put down her datapad and looked at her sister-in-law. “It’s going well. The supplies are paid for already. Now we need to get them from the warehouse and on the Errant Venture quietly.”

Mara smiled. “Well, we have some very qualified people for this job. So, who is going to go there, aside from Booster and his usual assortment of houseguests?”

“Well, Nabon and Dogder, to start. I got an impression that they wouldn’t mind spending some time with their old friend. Talon said he’d come, if we decide it’s needed. We’re going too, of course. Some other people volunteered, but if what Nabon discovered is correct, and I don’t see any reason not to trust her, we really don’t need the whole squadron for that. Even Errant Venture is overkill.”

“They have only one frigate analog in orbit, correct?”

“Yes, and a couple of small transport ships for delivering cargo to the planet.”

“Well, it can’t carry more than thirty six skips, and the Dozen can take care of them while you and Nabon deal with the transport ships. A bit of a stretch, but they’ll manage. And a Star Destroyer is more than a match for the frigate analog, especially if Booster still has a squadron or so of starfighters stashed onboard. Shouldn’t be any trouble. Well,” she amended, answering Leia’s wry glance, “apart from our family tradition of finding some. But I hope this time Solo’s luck and Durron’s luck might negate each other.”

“Minus multiplied by minus...”

“Makes plus. Especially if you add Booster to the equation.”

Leia’s quiet laugh was infectious, and Mara, finally, gave up the effort of keeping a straight face, and joined her. 

“How are things on the Council?” Leia asked her in a couple of minutes.

“Tedious. Half of the time I want to ask – _politely_ , of course - for those highly esteemed blathering idiots to shut the kriff up and then explain the matter in ten words or less. Another couple of days, and I might give up and do it. All right, Farmboy and Cilghal, even Tresina Lobi I can understand. But Durron? How did he bring himself to endure all that pointless chatter for half a year?”

“Kyp can be patient,” Leia said, returning to her datapad. “He just rarely bothers.”

“Leia,” Mara said hesitantly. “Can I ask you something?”

The big brown eyes looked at her with surprise. “About Kyp?”

“Yes.”

Leia shrugged and put the datapad aside. “Go on.”

Mara was suddenly having trouble finding words. “How do you deal with the way... with Han’s relationship with him? Are you really comfortable with it? Does it bother you that they are so close?”

The former Chief of State snorted. “That was very tactfully put. You mean, does it bother me that Han thinks of him as more of a son than Jacen, or even Anakin?”

“Well, yes, that too. But I was thinking mostly along the line of him being so attached to someone who’s not a member of the family.”

“As far as Han is concerned, Kyp is a member of the family.”

“But not as far as you’re concerned.”

“Well, no. But for Han, I’m willing to make an effort. I understand that letting my old jealousy interfere with our relationships now is unwise, not to mention unfair.”

Mara lifted an eyebrow. “Jealousy?” She thought that Han’s feelings for Kyp were purely parental. Were Leia’s and her situations more similar than she thought?

“Yes, jealousy. When Han brought him from Kessel, my first feeling was pity, of course. I don’t think you saw him back then – he was a really sorry sight, as pale as an earthworm, emaciated, and covered in wounds and marks left after his interrogation in the Maw Installation. But pitying him was my first mistake. He distanced himself immediately. He never was rude, or even slightly impolite, but he didn’t want to be near me, and that meant he attached himself to Han like a leech. And, what galled me the most, Han didn’t even try to tell him no, not even once. Kyp wanted to go diving? They went diving. Kyp wanted to go to a museum? They went to a museum. Kyp wanted to go to the Deeply Religious concert? They went. Can you imagine Han at such a show? I couldn’t, but there they were. And so it went for more than a month. Not that Han wasn’t noticing his own children, but it was much, much less than what he was giving to Kyp. I couldn’t understand it. He hadn’t seen them in months, and now, when they finally came home, when we finally were a real family, he was paying them less attention than to some stranger he just met! 

“Now I understand why he did it, of course. It wasn’t because he didn’t love them. But, being just two years old, they were simply less interesting for him than Kyp was. Kyp was smart and intelligent, he looked up to Han, and Han could talk with him, really talk. I do realize it now, but then, I just started to resent Kyp’s presence. I think he sensed it, he’s highly empathic, you know, and that’s why he insisted on going to Yavin instead of staying with us for at least a couple of months more. If I only could have predicted then... but I was thinking about how to get rid of him, not how to help him.”

“It wasn’t your business, Leia.”

“Wasn't it? It wouldn’t have taken a lot of effort to organize counseling for him. If he was my subordinate, I would have definitely done that. But he seemed to be all right, and I didn’t want to bother.

“When he went to the Academy, I was relieved – right up to the moment when he started to blow up worlds in our faces, and I found out that he somehow managed to almost kill my brother. And after learning all that, Han insisted on going after him, leaving me and the children on Yavin 4. He said he wasn’t needed there, and that he was probably the only one who could stop Kyp. It was the truth, he wasn’t, and he was, but the mere fact that he still cared about Kyp to such extent, after everything the boy had done... that’s where I realized that getting rid of Kyp physically was the least of my problems. 

“And that’s why I stayed as far away as possible when they put him on trial. I couldn’t bring myself to defend him, and I couldn’t afford to speak against him, Han would have never forgiven me. He took the role of Kyp’s defender upon himself, and he would have stuck to it before the entire Galaxy, if needed.”

Leia shrugged tiredly. “What could I have done? Han loves him. Luke does too, for that matter. He took Kyp back without a word of reproach. I didn’t want to fight with my own husband and brother. Even if I had won, the damage that such a fight could have caused would have been worse than the status quo. And then, somewhere along the years, I stopped resenting him. It wasn’t really fair of me – not on him, although that goes without saying, but on Han. I thought: do I really think that my husband’s heart is so small that it can’t possibly include me, his children, and someone else? Do I really think he has so little to give? As soon as I started to think of it that way, everything slotted into place. 

“All right, so I didn’t like Kyp. I didn’t like most of Han’s friends, after all, but I never tried to keep him away from them. No one said I had to like Kyp in order to tolerate him. And, amazingly, as soon as I decided I could tolerate him, I started to like him.” Leia shrugged. “Somewhat. Chalk it up to the ‘he’s not really that bad’ category. That episode with the worldship made me really mad at him for a while, but I can’t say I don’t understand his motives. He made up for it on Hapes. So, right now, we’re good. I’m even starting to worry about him if I don’t see him or hear from him for some time.”

“And you never regretted giving up that fight?”

Leia looked at her brother’s wife intently. “You tell me, Mara. As far as I know, you took the other road, and kept Luke away from Kyp as much as possible. Was it worth the trouble?”

Mara sighed. “No. Not in the long run.”

“Then why do you ask?”

“Just want to be sure. It irks me, giving up something I was pretty intent on for so many years.” 

“Did you ever regret not killing Luke?”

The former Emperor’s Hand stared at her. “You draw very funny comparisons, Leia.”

The Princess smiled. “No, not really.”

The door to the apartment whooshed open and Han stepped over the threshold, stopping immediately after taking one look inside. “Should I go back and pretend I wasn’t here?” he asked warily.

The women exchanged glances and laughed. “Come inside, Han,” Leia told him, stepping close and pulling him in by hand. “We weren’t plotting anything.”

“Is that supposed to be a good thing?” Han muttered under his breath, allowing himself to be dragged.

***

He woke to a multitude of light kisses raining on his back, and just lie quietly for a few minutes, absorbing the tender caresses and the feeling of total, unshadowed happiness coming from his lover. It was so contagious that Luke felt his lips stretching in a wide, silly smile. The joy that was coming from Kyp had an added luster of novelty in it, of something never experienced before, and, all of a sudden, Luke felt an unexplainable, and admittedly unbecoming, elation over beating his own niece to _that_. No matter what would happen between Jaina and Kyp in the future, he would always remain the first. 

“Still think we wouldn’t have been good together?” he asked without thinking, and regretted it immediately.

The kisses stopped. The spell was broken, although Kyp’s happy mood remained untarnished. “It’s not about sex, Luke,” he said finally. “It’s not even about love.”

“What is it about, then?”

“Compatibility. I told you – we’re too different. You don’t seem to realize the practical consequences of this. Take any issue, and three times out of four we’ll have diametrically opposite opinions about it. As long as all we are concerned about is each other, everything goes well, but we can’t live our entire lives like that.”

Luke sighed. “Then why doesn’t that convince me, and why I can’t just put this thought aside and forget about it?”

He felt a cheek pressing between his shoulder blades, and by the round firmness of it he understood Kyp was smiling. “Because you’re starting to get a bit too proprietary about me. Which is not a bad thing per se, but I’m starting to get too comfortable with it. Probably it’s for the best that we don’t have much time.”

Luke thought he understood what Kyp meant. Even the strongest man might become tired of his strength and want to be sheltered and protected for a while. And it had been very natural for Luke, whose caring instincts were always strong, to answer such a call with alacrity. But it wasn’t Kyp’s usual behavior model, and while it had been pleasant and necessary for a while, as soon as Kyp regained his strength, Luke’s protective smothering would become redundant. Knowing that Luke was going to be there for him was one thing, but getting too used to being cared for was quite another. As usual, Kyp foresaw a need for a change sooner than Luke did.

He turned to look at his lover’s face. Kyp still looked sleepy, with tousled hair and heavy-lidded gaze, but the smile on his face, the careless, childish smile, was something that made his face transcend from handsome into radiant. Luke could do nothing else but kiss him voraciously, and see the smile improved vastly by reddened lips. And then he kissed Kyp again, just because he could, and because it felt so kriffin’ right. Somewhere in the middle of this second kiss he felt Kyp taking possession of both their morning erections, bringing them together in the tight circle of his hands. One kiss flowed into another, and then into mutual orgasm, not as earth-shattering as some of the previous ones, but very intimate and companionable. 

“We have to do something about this,” Luke said, still a bit breathless, afterwards. “Getting a hard-on every time we look at each other will land us into a scandal sooner or later.”

Kyp snickered. “Tunics and ill-fitting pants. Although such a sartorial change might be a scandal in itself, at least for me. Come on, Luke, you have more control than that!”

“Not where you’re concerned,” Luke admitted honestly. 

“Meditation,” Kyp snickered. “Serenity. There is no passion, remember?”

“Uh-huh,” Luke said, patently unconvinced.

“Piece of junk, isn’t it? I bet Odan-Urr was as old as dirt by the time he wrote that code. Passion is a little hard to sustain for a thousand years, so let’s declare it superfluous and harmful. I wonder how many Sith apprentices this one line created.”

“I often ask myself if the Order was right, accepting his version of the Code as the primary one.”

“Yes, the other ones make much more sense. And much harder to misinterpret. Luke, as a post-coital conversation, this theme sucks!”

Luke laughed quietly, nuzzling his lover’s neck. “Want to get up?”

“Not yet. And let’s postpone the run, all right? I feel too good to exercise right now.”

“Whatever you say. How are your shields?”

“Almost done. You know,” he said with wonder, “it’s much easier this time. I’m finding out that I don’t need some of them anymore.”

“Old wounds don’t fester any longer?”

“Yes,” Kyp answered, awed. “I don’t know how it happened. I can’t understand why all that isn’t tearing me raw the way it used to. I still remember everything, but it’s so distant now, as if I read it in a book. It doesn’t have any power over me any more. How did you do that?”

“I didn’t, love. You did.”

“Riiiiight.”

“Well, I don’t have an explanation either. Find a psychologist and ask him, and don’t forget to tell me the answer afterwards, I’d like to know it too. All right, the run is off, but how about a shower and some sun?”

“One correction – a breakfast in-between.”

“You’re cooking?”

“Only if you’re not going to bitch about spices. I’m half-Corellian, remember, it’s in my blood. Live with it.”

Despite Kyp’s declarations, he actually proved to be pretty decent about applying the scorching products of the Corellian food industry, although Luke still needed a couple glasses of milk to wash it through. 

“When are you going to take your umbrella off me?” Kyp asked over the caf.

Luke raised an eyebrow. “I did it when you were cooking. You didn’t notice?”

Kyp froze with a cup at his mouth. “No. But I still feel you...”

“Well, concentrate and see what exactly you’re feeling me through.”

“You’re right,” Kyp said in a minute. “It’s the bond. And I don’t feel the usual emotional traffic, not even barely...”

“I told you – the scab.”

“I don’t like it. I feel like I’m half-deaf.”

“Well, it’ll give you an opportunity to appreciate the positive side of your sensitivity for a change.”

Kyp snorted. “Ever the optimist. Are you sure it’s temporary?”

“Pretty sure. Don’t sweat it.”

They sat in comfortable silence for some time. Luke didn’t know what Kyp was thinking about – after the younger man had rebuilt his shields it became much harder to get a peek into his thoughts, although Luke still could gauge his emotions pretty accurately. But Luke’s mind was revolving around the issue of how he was going to present the new developments to Mara. Neither his new bond with Kyp, not his realization that he indeed loved Kyp and wasn’t willing to give this love up were something she had counted on when she gave him her permission to have sex with Kyp. His wife was not going to be happy, and it might take a lot of carefully handled assurance before she would believe that it wasn’t going to affect the relationship between them, that Luke had enough love in his heart to give to both of them, without either one of his loves being neglected.

Suddenly he felt a spike of surprise from Kyp. “What?” he asked automatically.

“I just figured something out,” Kyp answered slowly.

“What exactly?”

“My attraction to you. It was puzzling me for years. No offence, Luke, but I knew quite a number of men who were no less attractive than you, if not more, and wanted me just as much as you do. Some of them even loved me, but I never felt anything even close to what I feel toward you for any of them. I finally figured that out.”

“Don’t keep me in suspense,” Luke said dryly. He wasn’t sure he would like what Kyp was going to say.

“Well,” started Kyp slowly. “I think my first relationship with a man left a sort of an imprint on me.”

“You’re comparing me to your Kessel patron?” Luke asked, aghast.

Kyp took one of Luke’s hands and brought it to his face, leaning his cheek on the back of Luke’s palm. “Luke... don’t take it wrong, please. But, essentially, yes, the pattern is the same. The word ‘Master’ has two meanings, but it’s not the same word for nothing. The difference, and it’s quite crucial, is that in one case the submission is forced, when in the other it’s given voluntarily, out of respect and trust. You are the opposite side of the same thing Simge was – an older man, a teacher, someone who I can, well, look up to. But looking up to you is quite different from looking up at Master S from a position on my knees. One is abuse, the other is love, and I’m so glad I finally was able to appreciate the difference fully.”

And that’s probably why it didn’t hurt anymore. “Oh,” Luke sighed. “Well, if you look at it from that angle...”

Kyp smiled at him beatifically. “Thank you, Master.”

Luke laughed. “Oh, come on!” He turned his hand and stroked Kyp’s high cheekbone. “You’re very welcome – and thanks for giving me a second chance.”

The younger man chuckled suddenly. “Listen, did you ever wonder why the only lasting intimate relationships in your life were with your students: me and Mara? Seems that this pattern is natural for you, too.”

Now, that was something Luke had never thought about. “You think I can have a long-term relationship only with someone who is likely to submit to me, however voluntary?” he asked, not liking the idea at all.

“I don’t think it’s about submission. Submission is just a by-product. I think it’s about giving and about readiness to take, or to accept what is given. You’re attracted to strong people... kriff, I don’t think they come any stronger than me and your wife, honestly. But you need to give, it’s your instinct, and most strong people have huge trouble with being an object of giving instead of giving themselves.” The name ‘Callista’ hung in the air between them, unspoken. “But your students don’t have this problem – we already chose to accept what you can give. Taking that to the area of love and sex is just the next step, and not a big one.”

Kyp was making so much sense that Luke felt almost frightened. “For some reason,” he sighed heavily, “I always forget how intelligent you are. Is that another by-product of that teacher mentality?”

The younger man smirked. “Probably. But I don’t mind reminding you from time to time. And, please notice, you really had a lot of trouble convincing both me and Mara that you deserved to be called Master by us. Both of us made you sweat for it, quite a lot. That might be important, too.”

“Well,” Luke drawled, “in playing hard to get both of you were the masters, that’s for sure.”

They laughed together, closing the subject, at least for a while. Luke had to think about it – the angle at which Kyp presented the issue was certainly interesting. 

They went outside and stretched out on the sand that was already pleasantly warm. “I ought to come here some other time,” Kyp said absentmindedly. “Probably after the war. I might even convince Jaya to come with me – or I can just apply the same tactic to her as you did to me. I’m sure she too can use some quiet time in a pleasant place to stop and think about what the kriff she’s doing with her life.”

“Yeah, I tried to talk her into taking a break, but she’s just as pigheaded about that as you are.”

“And for the same reason, I bet. Although she did some thinking on Ebaq, when they were sitting in those caverns waiting to be rescued, but she refused to share any details, and I was too out of sorts to insist.”

“Reversal of roles, Kyp?”

“Hmmm?”

“What you said about you and me can be applied to you and Jaina – only in reverse.”

“Yeah? Well, I suppose it can. Talk about a pervasive pattern.”

“And, if I’m not mistaken, she’s making you sweat for it, too.”

Kyp smiled. “That she does. But I like it this way. I like to have her challenging me and keeping me on my toes. I hope she’ll never stop.”

Luke looked at him thoughtfully. “Do you know how weird it feels, to compete in a way with my own niece?”

“What, for me? Come on, Luke, there is no competition at all. My relationships with you and with her are too different to compete.”

“Well, for your own sake, don’t tell her about you and I. I don’t think she is quite ready to see me in this light – or you, for that matter.”

The younger man just laughed. “I’ll think of it when it becomes an issue to worry about. If.”

“Oh, she’ll come around. You did, after all.”

“Do you really want her to?”

“Of course. I want both of you to be happy. I’m not that egoistical. You’re right about one thing – you two fit each other perfectly. It’ll be a shame if, for some stupid reason, this union doesn’t happen.”

They lay quietly for some time, then Luke asked: “Kyp?”

“Yes?”

“I’m curious about one thing. Who made you break your dry spell? As far as I remember, you spent a year in the Academy as chaste as a monk, and then I suddenly found out that you started to accept pretty much every proposition that came sailing your way. What happened?”

His lover laughed. “Oh, that’s quite a story. A classical tale of expecting to find one thing and finding another. Two other things, in this case. I went to some backward planet that didn’t have anything to offer except some pastoral landscapes and a lot of various livestock, to research the rumors of some mysterious and powerful Jedi taking up residence there and awing everyone, starting from peasants and ending with their goats. What I found were a Corellian smuggler who began with almost becoming my judge, jury and executioner, and ended with offering me a place in her crew; and her partner, a former Hutt counselor and current con artist, who had some interesting ideas about thanking me for saving her life. It was she who was posing as the awesome Jedi, by the way, and she did a very good job of it.”

“So, which one of them? Or both?”

Kyp gave him a withering look. “Come on, I was barely up to one of them then! Not to mention that Fen was easily twenty-five years older than I was, and was feeling just as parental about me as Han. That would have been too vapin’ incestuous.”

“So, the Corellian smuggler’s name was Fen? Wait a minute! I thought the description sounded familiar. Fenig Nabon and Ghitsa Dogder?”

“Yes. How do you know about them?”

“Talon mentioned them a couple of times through the years. Aren’t they in Smugglers Squadron now?”

“They are? I didn’t know that.”

“I’m pretty sure about that. All right, start at the beginning. It should be quite a story.”

The dark green eyes twinkled. “Yes, Master!”

“Oh, shut up!”

“Make up your mind, Luke!”

“You frippin’ well know what I mean!”

Kyp finally gave up and laughed. “Needling you is just not a good sport at all. All right. If you remember, you went to Ithor at the time. Half of the folks in the Academy decided to take a vacation as well, and in less than a week it had gotten so quiet and peaceful that I decided it might be a good time to bugger off, and see how far away I could manage to get by hitchhiking. I wanted to get a look at the galaxy, but not from the cockpit of Sun Crusher. I hopped on the very next supply ship that landed on Yavin 4 and there it all began.

“I had all of twenty-something credits in my pocket, but I had my lightsaber and my piloting skills, and quite a number of people proved to be willing to believe in the second when they saw the first. Luckily, you made the whole Galaxy think that the words ‘Jedi’ and ‘pilot’ are synonyms. Sometimes one captain recommended me to another, and I even managed to earn some money along with a free passage. Oh, I didn’t tell my name to anyone, of course. No one asked for identification, thankfully.”

“And you, of course, had nothing to do with it.”

“Well,” smiled Kyp. “Just a little. I liked being Zeth Fost too much to get busted. Anyway, I don’t even remember on which planet it happened, but I heard the rumors. The old man who was telling the story was quite eloquent in his praises of the wonderful Jedi Ghitsa. Now, I knew quite well that we had no one by that name in the Order, so it sounded more than a bit strange. Of course, it could have been one of our people, who, just as I, decided to try another name for a while, but the description didn’t match anyone. I was intrigued to the point of paying for the passage to this Psi…shardia, I think it was called.”

“Never heard of it.”

“Well, no wonder. Compared to it, Tatooine is a pretty lively place. Although the climate there is nice...”

Luke suddenly raised his hand, interrupting Kyp. “Wait.”

“What?” the younger man asked, sensing his concentration.

“Mara. She’s coming.”

Kyp looked at him with wide eyes, then swore loudly, this time in Corellian. “We ran out of time, then,” he said in a hollow voice and stood up quickly. “You’ll have to listen to this story some other time… in another thirteen years, probably.”

Luke jerked him toward himself with such force that Kyp lost his balance and practically fell into his arms. “No,” Luke told him quietly, but firmly. “I told you – never again. I’ll deal with Mara. I’m not giving you up.” Suddenly, he knew just the thing to say. “What is it, a relapse?” he asked, cocking his head and doing his best to imitate Zeth’s curt tones.

Kyp stared at him and then burst out laughing. He laughed so hard that Luke was starting to get worried. What the kriff was that, hysterics? And Kyp was doing so well…

“What are you laughing about, you git?” he asked impatiently.

“Zeth,” Kyp squeezed out. “Do you think he considered these weeks entertaining enough?”

“Filswik…” Luke exhaled slowly. Only now the idea that Kyp’s ghostly brother must have seen everything they had been doing penetrated his mind. “Do you think he had the decency to close his eyes from time to time?”

Kyp just looked at him sarcastically. “The visual representation of a Force ghost…”

“…said one Jedi Master to another. I know, I know. I just hope my ghosts weren’t taking seats in the first row as well.”

“Now that’s a sickening thought!”

Luke slapped his sand-covered butt. “Come on. We have to clean the house. I don’t see any sense in rubbing Mara’s nose in the reality of it, even if she gave me her blessing.”

“Yeah… Luke?”

“Yes, love?”

Kyp smiled sadly. “I’m going to miss that. Anyway… listen, if she wants to know, show her everything. I don’t mind. If she wants to have pictures…”

“Are you serious?”

“Totally. I suppose I owe her.”

“You two are so similar, it’s positively nauseating!”

“What? Why?”

“She said the same thing about you. Come on, let’s go. I have no idea how are we going to save that couch. We should have cleaned it up days ago.”

“Drag it outside and torch it?”

“Very funny. It’s a protected preserve, if you remember.”

“Oh well. I suppose we have to be inventive, then.” Kyp led the way into the house. “Sometimes the situation just calls for untraditional solutions and unneeded and excessive usage of the Force.” He flashed Luke a crooked smile. “Like when you don’t want to offend the delicate sensibilities of your lover’s wife. Or when your son splashes your daughter’s best leather tunic with oil right before the gathering of the Clans and makes himself scarce. Watch and learn.” With that he found a clean towel and put it over one of the polymerized oily spots, covering it with his palm.

When he took his hand off, the cloth was dirty with oil under it. There was not a smudge on the couch’s upholstery. Luke snorted. “Don’t let any of our women know you can do that.”

“I’m not willing to live the rest of my life as a piece of household equipment... Luke?” he asked with a catch in his voice. “Why are we doing this?”

Luke didn’t have to ask what ‘this’ was. These were the last moments they could spend with each other, and only with each other, and they were wasting it on banter. Life hadn’t even spared them enough time for one last lovemaking. Even a goodbye kiss seemed inappropriate; the dream was over, and there wasn’t any place for it in the old reality. But he still craved something, something that would remain...

A connection.

“Here,” he said hoarsely, opening his arms, and Kyp came into them immediately, returning Luke’s vice-like embrace with equal force. Neither of them needed the reassurance of their bond to know what it meant to the other. “We will never be over, Kyp,” Luke whispered. “One way or another.”

“I know,” the younger man answered. “Lovers, friends, or brothers – it doesn’t matter in the long run.”

“Yes. Until we die.”

“Not even then. I’m not saying goodbye, not ever.”

“Good. Don’t.” 

When they were finally able to let go of each other, neither could say how much time had passed. “We still have to clean up,” Kyp said regretfully.

“Yes, and put on some pants.”

“Did you ever recover my flightsuit?”

“No, sorry. I forgot.”

“Never mind. I’ll find something in Dohar’s things that isn’t ripped in interesting places.”

They managed, but it was a close run.

“You two look disgustingly healthy and rested,” was the first thing they heard from Mara when she jumped out of the speeder.

She, however, looked anything but. The red hair highlighted the paleness of her face, as if she hadn’t been in the sun in weeks, and the tired wrinkles around her eyes and mouth were painfully evident. “Skywalker, I’m telling you one thing: you’re not talking me into substituting for you again even for the Jewel of Haarkan.”

Luke felt a pang of guilt. Kyp just smiled, looking at her with camaraderie he never displayed before. “Tedious, aren’t they?”

“That’s exactly the word. Now I think that assigning you to this Council was a very effective punishment. Congratulations, farmboy. It was a brilliant idea, sorry I didn’t catch it sooner.”

Luke laughed and hugged her wholeheartedly. “Sorry, Mara. How about staying here for a couple of hours? The bath in this house is indecently luxurious.”

His wife sighed. “Can’t, unfortunately. I brought messages – Durron, you have to listen to them. Can we go inside?”

“Of course,” Luke agreed, extremely glad for their last minute cleanup.

Inside, Mara pulled a small recorder from the pocket of her jumpsuit. “Here. You should be able to understand it without Threepio’s help, Kyp.” And she pressed the play button.

Luke recognized Kirana Ti’s voice immediately and with great trepidation, but it was nothing compared to immediate wave of sick horror that washed over Kyp. Luke never understood Old Dathomiri well, despite Kirana’s and Kyp’s efforts to teach him over the years, but he knew enough to catch the gist of his old student’s message. When Alleinn’s young voice interjected into Kirana’s narrative, he finally drew a breath, only then realizing that he had forgot to breathe. He looked at his lover. Kyp’s face was horribly pale, but the color was returning to it gradually. 

The message ended. Suddenly Kyp grabbed the recorder and turned to the door with a very obvious intent of running out of it and into the speeder, but Mara caught his upper arm. “Not so fast, hotshot.”

“Jade!” Kyp exclaimed, glaring at her. “I can’t waste time! I need to find supplies... organize something... kriff! Let me go!”

“Easy on turns, Durron. Everything is already organized. Cool down and don’t jump into an X-wing without life support.”

Kyp froze. “Everything is organized? What do you mean?”

“We received this message six days ago. The supplies are already purchased – you can thank the Irsennas for that – and loaded on Errant Venture. Booster is ready to take off and told me to tell you that he can’t wait to find out whose Jedi brats are worse, his or yours. Some of your old friends are coming along...”

“My old friends?” Kyp asked, puzzled.

“Nabon and Dogder. Remember them? They flew the reconnaissance, so you can ask them about the details on your way there.”

Luke laughed, seeing Kyp’s slack-jawed astonishment. Mara looked at the black-haired Jedi assessingly. “You know, Durron, for someone who was supposed to be a fearsome smuggler hunter, you have suspiciously many friends amongst smugglers.”

“I never hunted indiscriminately, Mara,” Kyp answered seriously. 

“Anyway,” continued Luke’s wife after a short pause. “Han and Leia are coming too, of course – Han wants to make sure you won’t attempt anything too stupid. Octa has the Dozen on red alert. Now the only question is: are you fit to fly?”

Kyp turned back to the table, took two Geldan sun-apples from the bowl of fruits that had been left there after breakfast, and, while Luke was still trying to understand why he did it, threw one of them at the central column. The second one followed just a millisecond later. The two fruits met in the air right before colliding with the column, one hitting exactly after the other, creating one messy spot instead of two. 

“Does that answer your question?” Kyp asked impatiently.

“Neat trick,” she observed. “Might be useful for amusing the locals on some backwater planet. All right, now my conscience is clear about this negating of your grounding order that I signed with farmboy’s credentials.”

“My grounding order?” Kyp asked, even more puzzled.

“The one that Traest Kre’fey put on you at my request,” Luke explained.

“You had me grounded?!” That was definitely a shriek of outrage.

Luke just shrugged unrepentantly. “Want to talk about this now?”

Kyp just gaped at him.

“Mara,” Luke asked, turning to his wife. “What about the Council? Is Cal likely to get a brain stroke if one of us vanishes again for Force knows how long?”

His wife shrugged. “This week is free of meetings. Luckily.”

“How so?” Now Luke was surprised.

“Everyone on the government end is a little too busy. The Senate is boiling, and Triebakk can’t afford to leave even one hearing. Releqy is out visiting some of the planets with the highest concentration of refugee camps...”

The door banged behind them and Luke jumped in place. “Kyp!”

“Oh, no!” Mara said in a tone of horrified outrage. “He’s doing it again!”

After both of them ran outside, Luke understood what Mara’s exclamation meant. The abducted speeder was already a good twenty meters from the shore, and Kyp was closing the canopy. “Enjoy your vacation, you two!” he yelled to them. “I’ll send Dohar and Taira to fetch you before the next Council meeting.”

“Durron!” Mara yelled back at him. “You’re a kriffin’ definition of bad habits that die hard!”

The only answer she got was the sound of laughter, clearly heard over the water, and a whoosh of the closing canopy. 

Luke was unable to contain his laughter. “Admit it, Mara,” he squeezed out. “He owed you something like that.”

His wife turned to him with her hands firmly planted on her hips. Only now Luke noticed that the corners of her lips were twitching slightly.

“In every sense,” she agreed, deadpan. Then she took a closer look at their surroundings. “You know what, lover,” she drawled.

“What?” Luke asked obligingly.

“I see a lot of trees around.”


End file.
